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1) That is possible. It is also possible that such narcotics have been used for a very long time by priests and medicine men. It is possible that jews had been using it as well since opium was a known product in the Middle East and in Egypt.

A certain tomb in egypt has been found to contain the poppy plant placed with the mummy.
There are a few examples of opium being known and used in Egypt.
Source:
https://www.atthemummiesball.com/poppies-ancient-egypt/
Opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) was also known to ancient Egyptians although the date of its introduction is uncertain. In addition to its use as a narcotic, it was cultivated for its seeds which were used for culinary purposes and as a source of oil (2 subspecies have been distinguished somniferum Corb. for the opium and hortensis (husenot) Corb. for the oil).

But what does taking such drugs do? It makes the person feel high? Makes them hallucinate about things they think about often?

Such drug use is still important to some tribes in South America and in Africa. They also think that it puts them in touch with the gods. That is a strange line of thinking.

You were talking about true essence. What is the true essence? Are you suppose to have more knowledge about something?

It might be possible to get a natural high as well. I have seen the effects of religion on people. They seem to go into a trance, they shake, they make weird noises.
It might be useful for being creative, for writing new music, for imagining scenes you have never seen before, for making new stories.

2)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: “Believers! Obey Allah and obey the Messenger, and those from among you who are invested with authority; “ (Al-Nisa 59)

Well, it has to say obey the jewish god because that is the goal of the book (Koran).
It has to say obey the messenger because the messenger is the one that is doing the talking. The people can only hear the messenger. Most likely, the god and the messenger are the same person.
It also seems to be saying to obey your government, obey the cops in a non-explicit way.

The other options are not available:
1. The text is certainly not going to say to ignore the messenger and listen to the jewish god. If it did do this, the people would all claim that they are not hearing the jewish god.
In these jewish flavor of religions, it is expected that the god only talks to one human. In reality, all religions are like that. Can you name me a religion in which the god character talks to all the people?
2. If the text were to say to disobey the government, that would make it impossible to form a country, a strong union. As soon as a church gains sufficient power, it turns into a government.


So, the only logical choice is to tell the people to obey the messenger (church) and obey the government. The church and government would form a union eventually and you get a theocracy.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: That’s because there are Hadiths (sayings) of the prophet + verses in the Quran that are instructing us to use our reason (before our personal dogmas and/or beliefs) and to respect people who have scientific knowledge:

The text can’t tell people to not use reason.
Also, you can’t use reason to choose which religion is correct. You would have to use evidence and religions don’t have evidence to back up the claims they make.
For example, Mohamed (the master leader of islam) can’t provide evidence that he is talking to an alien.

There is no mention of respect people who have scientific knowledge.
Also, in terms of science, we live in a naturalistic world (See my explanation as to why Occam’s Razor is used). When you follow this path, it leaves no room for aliens and alien-gods and bird people.
When you follow this path, lightning is not caused by gods, volcanoes are a natural event, you have planet formation with no gods involved, etc.

So, science and religion are in conflict with each other bc one says that the gods do something in this universe while the other treats such concepts as “god of the gaps” explanations that are to be replaced by real knowledge.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: So arguing with scientific evidence based on observation is an egocentric thing. That’s the Ego raging in a Pharaoh mentality. He is the one who knows best so who is the scientist? (Just like in the story of Moses).

What do you mean?

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: And religious people do that. Here we even had religious leaders who said that “The moon (according to the Quran) was made of “Nur” (divine light) so it was absurd to think that the Americans landed a man of it”. (and this story is real it’s not an Urban legend).

I have heard of it. My cousin was working someplace, I think in Lebanon. I don’t know the year but arab cultures tend to be less educated, specially in the 1980s and before. Today’s arab cultures seem to be more urban.
Apparently, the town where he was, they really believed that the Moon came out of the water. The priest’s job is to see the Moon coming out.
My cousin explained to them that the Moon is not reborn each night, that it does not come out of the water and that the united statians have landed on it in 1969.
The arabs went nuts.
Some people warned him that there is talks about killing him. So, my cousin packed his stuff and left the same night.

That is the story that I have heard from my mother. I should probably ask my cousin about it.

In any case, old time people believed in nonsense and the foundation of all these old time religions is nonsense.
Today’s generation let go of these beliefs. Probably the priests no longer mention such things so it gets erased from human memory.

The same sort of thing happens with Mormons. The mormons who grew up in the 50s find that today’s mormonism is very different.
As kids, they were taught to have prepared, nice clean shoes. Soon, they would be walking to Eden, which is suppose to be in the USA. I think Mississippi.
One of their top leaders was saying “Look, the native americans are getting lighter skin colors.” It is part of the mormon belief that having dark color skin is a curse from the jewish god. Keep in mind that in the mormon religion, they are taught that the top 3 leaders talk directly to god. There is another 7 leader below them and I think they also believe that these guys talk directly to god.
It is part of their belief that native americans are jews that came from Israel, I think 3000 y ago and another group of 40 jews came a little before year 1.
Europeans believe that jews are white skinned so they integrated that into their mormonism. Mormonism has been invented around 1829.
That doesn’t make sense. Jews would have darker skin colors, like the arabs of Saudi Arabia and nearby countries.
So, they are now trying to pretend that they are not racist. The blacks can now hold the priesthood, since the 70s.
They are claiming that the book of mormon doesn’t talk about skin color and that in fact, it means blackness on the inside.
They can’t admit that their numbers are reducing since it is part of their belief that mormonism will grow. (It is possible that the number of mormons in Utah has dropped to below 50% now).

In short, these are old time religions and what do you expect? They represent the cultures of their times. There will never be a super duper intelligent alien from space that is going to correct humans.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Erich von Daniken just made his money: I am an Archaeologist too and I had to stop Archaeology at some point and switched to a more lucrative field (and I am not the only one).
 
And as Richard Dawkins puts it, as far as Archaeology is concerned, “There is no need for fairies in the garden because the garden itself is already so amazing”.

It’s not that the universe is amazing.
The issue is that if you claim that the gods made life on Earth, you are going to have a hard time proving that. You are not going to observe a god creating anything. In short, science is not going to progress if you follow that direction.
Worst of all, what if you discover DNA and then find matching patterns in DNA that support evolution? That is the situation that the jewish religions are in. What science tells us doesn’t match with the Genesis story.
There is no aspect of science that supports Genesis. There was no global flood, no global extinction.
What do I expect? I expect that information that comes from a god to be scientific.

Theists tell me that the gods are shy, or that he doesn’t want to give evidence because he wants me to go to him, that gods are not in this universe (They are in some parallel universe).
What theists are saying might be true but the fact is, they don’t know whether or not the gods are shy. They are just making it up.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: So I’m a believer in exchanging ideas. I like the idea of there being new possibilities in intellectual terms

That’s fine. It is a better attitude than deciding to shun someone or to kill them.


3)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: There is this: Do you remember yourself as a 4 year old? Then as a 14 year old? Then as an 18 year old? Then today, when you go and see yourself in the mirror (and this is something I read in Shirley Mclaine). Do you feel like being radically different? It’s like the “you” or the  “I” is still there, not changing, still experiencing while the whole décor out there is changing. So this is our experience of our true self.

I see what you are saying.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: On Egyptians: They had a body of knowledge on occultism

How did they get knowledge on occultism?

Because if one of them wrote:
“if our heart is lighter than the feather of a bird” than we move directly to paradise (or heaven).”

he must have done something to get that knowledge.
The only problem I see is that saying ‘heart is lighter” is open to interpretation.
Also, what is paradise?

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: On Methodology: This isn’t an academic work. Academic works are for everyone. When you write your thesis and when is has been approved it will remain there for the decades and centuries to come and will be available for all future generations. Of course there are rules so if you say that “Chatalhoyuk was founded 1000 year earlier than previously thought” you have to argue about it and you have to support your argument with facts and observation. This will then be debated by the academic community and if you are right, that’s progress for all of us.

That’s normal. There has to be some rules to play by, sort of like a baseball game. The goals of science is to discover how nature operates or discover what humans have been up to in some area in the deep past. As long as everyone plays by the rules, science works. If someone comes along and says that some aliens have landed here and built a statue but can’t provide any evidence of aliens, then he is not playing by the rules.
That kind of scientist gets some disrespect from the community.

Even when you aren’t talking about science. Let’s say, we have 2 guys in the same room and they are both observing a cake. This sort of evidence is good enough. We can agree that the cake exists. The cake is not some extraordinary thing. If they describe the cake to me, I tend to not question it. The existence of the cake is not much important to me. If some egyptian from 4000 y ago writes about a recipe for cake, it isn’t a big deal. I would quickly accept that they were making cakes back then (as long as the writing is not a fake).

If that ancient egyptian writes about aliens such as Osiris, Ra, George and Bob,.... I know that primitive humans have this issue with reality. They tend to not know how things came into existence.
All these old cultures tend to make up some characters with magical powers that are riding the Sun, hiding behind the Moon, or one guy beheads his sister and throws the head into the sky and that becomes the Moon.
They all tend to claim some guy made this and that and humans and fish.

It is pretty clear to me that they have gaps in their knowledge. Some storyteller priest made up these stories. Each culture made up their own religions and so, they ended up with slightly different stories about the formation of the universe and its components. Also, note that they can’t name most of the components. They can only name components of nature that was visible to the naked eye.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: This isn’t how spirituality works. There are schools and groups and traditions that can be useful to some. But the works that is carried out is an individual work that may or may not result in personal spiritual growth. It’s not in competition with science. We are not studying Quantum physics or downloading new technology from aliens here. It’s about inner transformation. A bit like psychotherapy but this one is stronger and more effective because it’s free of charge and quite more effective than therapy groups actually (but do not think that I don’t believe in the value of traditional therapy. Again, it’s a different thing).

Maybe I don’t understand what we are talking about here.
1. When you say religion and spirituality, are you talking about finding out how some component of the universe functions?
2. Are you talking about stressors, things that stress you and you want to find ways to distress, and feel good?
3. Are you talking about closing your eyes and imagining being at a beach or some other planet, some other location?

Since you said psychotherapy, you seem to be talking about #2.


4,5)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: - No, I don’t agree with you. We are not that innocent. There are 45 million children around the world who are facing malnutrition right now. İs this happening because we lack the food?

1. Apparently, some of them lack food and infrastructure. There is the added effect of not using prophylactics.
If you have kids when you can’t feed them, it will appear as if you have a whole lot of kids that are malnourished.
The source of the problem is that in “poor” countries, they tend to not use prophylactics.
The countries with the highest birth rates are the countries that are “poor”. They also have a high proportion of people under age 30.

Giving them european cloths, cellphones, houses, food is not going to solve that bc that is what europeans have been doing for 50 y.
It has the effect of increasing their population and the original problem doesn’t get solved.

Christians play a big role in this problem. They advocate against the use of prophylactics.
So the population in Africa goes up quickly and also, there is the spread of the HIV virus.

Just giving them cloths is not good. It helps to make them forget the technics for clothsmaking of their ancestors, just like europeans have forgotten their old technics.
Converting them to christianity is not good. It helps to make them forget the religion of their ancestors.

2. I think you want to create a global community, and have a world where all humans work together in peace and harmony.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: The US military budget is 800 Billion dollar and growing

It is good that they do that. The rest of the european countries are sleeping. They can barely help Ukraine. England, Germany were reporting to run out of bullets and bombs.
I keep hearing about Canada not being able to afford new attack helicopters. What they have is from the 80s. Canada can barely afford to buy 4 jetfighters (F35?).
Also, it looks like they lost interest in Ukraine. They realized it is costing them a lot of money.
European countries have a foundation of money. Russia has a foundation of pride and patriotism.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: I’m in a third world country here. If the police catches me with a hunter’s knife they will ask me questions. (So this isn’t really how it’s supposed to work).

I thought you were in Turkey, which would be a 1 st world country.

I think what you want is for people to spend less on weapons and to use that money to send food to poor countries.
People aren’t united yet and probably never will be.
People are tribal. They prefer their own kind, same skin color, same culture, same religion.

Even if it is someone from your own tribe, let’s say someone gets into a car accident, you hear it on the news, how much time do you spend thinking about it?
That person is no one for you. He has no meaning for you. It is just a name you hear on the news for a minute and the next minute, you already forgot them.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: I’m in a third world country here. If the police catches me with a hunter’s knife they will ask me questions. (So this isn’t really how it’s supposed to work).

I thought you were in Turkey, which would be a 1 st world country.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Why don’t our governments invest massively into green technologies and try to avoid the worst outcomes of climate change?

1. Changing the system will cost a lot.
2. People today are not going to tolerate failures. See my previous comment.
3. Some of the rich class, the petrol guys, don’t want to lose their investment.
4. Making changes makes people uncomfortable.
5. There are a bunch of green technologies and this confuses people. People want to choose the one and only super best technology and there is probably no such thing.

There is a nice green technology called the Bicycle. It is 500 y old and works just fine. Not many people use it to get around. It makes them feel inferior. As soon as someone reaches 16 to 18, they want a car and leave the bike in the garage.

For #2, there is a company that makes Sun Chips. They started to make their bags with polylactose (I think). It is a bioplastic. It makes a lot of noise when you crinkle it. After about 2 y, they decided to stop it stating that reason. What a stupid excuse.

In Montreal, they pushed to get people to use reusable bags instead of plastic bags. Paper bags have made a comeback.
The problem is that most plastic is not recycled at all. They just ship it to China or Indonesia. They pay a company over there to take it. The company over there just stockpiles and sometimes burns the plastic.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: My idea is: We have to do the inner work.

It sounds to me that you have made a decision. You want to help starving people, you want to get rid of world borders and be one people living in harmony, you want to protect the ecology.
So, why are you a muslim?

Jair Bolsonaro is conservative, he is religious. He was the president of Brazil from 2019 to 2022.
G.W. Bush is conservative, he is religious. He was the president of the USA from 2000 to 2004, I think.
The more religious you are, for some reason, the less you trust scientists. I think it is because such people associate science with atheism. They grow up in their churches and probably the priest talks about the Big bang theory and Evolution theory is against the jewish god. They probably view scientists as people who think they are smarter than the jewish god. I have been told a bunch of times that “I think I know everything.”, “I think I know more than god”, “I am arrogant and god will cut me down.”. I am not a scientist but if you talk about science, the theist shows his contempt for science.

Another good example is the COVID situation. Religious people were against wearing masks, they were against any measure that mitigates the spreading of COVID. Quite a lot of priests in the USA had videos about COVID. Some said COVID doesn’t exist, others say COVID is just the flu, COVID is less dangerous than the flu, hospitals are reporting false death numbers, more people die from influenza than COVID, COVID is part of a masterplan from illuminati and the Rothschild and freemasons. A lot of them were upset that they had to shutdown their churches.
Some church and its people in Alberta were protesting.

There is someone named Romana Didulo who has a QAnon cult. This seems to be somewhat relation to religion (She mentions god). She is in Canada.
She and her group went to some police station and tried to arrest the police and they wanted to execute the police. This lady, Romana Didulo, uses the word execute a lot when it comes to disagreeing with other people.
She thinks that the COVID thing is some kind of master plan.

This might be the right video in which they try to arrest the police.
Qanon Cult Leader Starts A Compound
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trUqlczhwmI
By Owen Morgan (Telltale)
Length = 50:08


So, not trusting scientists has some part in it in religion being anti-science.
Another reason is that life is hard, people need jobs, the rich don’t want their investments ruined.

Donald Trump: Yes, this guy is all about the ego. He is arrogant. It’s part of his narcissistic personality.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Solar system:

This was an allegory. We all have our worldly dreams. Maybe I exaggerated when I said that “it doesn’t matter”. But it’s good to remember that nothing we see is really that important. That’s what I wanted to say.

I see.

7)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: There are similar approaches to Islam too. They are crazy about the headscarf for instance. They will not rest until each and every female walking this earth thinks and behaves the way they want to.

Some religions have rules about what you have to wear. I don’t know what is written on what page in the case of Islam, but isn’t women covering up their heads part of the rules?
Even if it is not part of the original text, religions can evolve over time.
The original leader dies and the new leader takes over. The new leader gets a phone call from the gods and they tell him “New rule. Cover your heads.”

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Otherwise you may end up like this guy claiming that no one could possibly land on the Moon because it is made of divine light.

This is probably like the case of the woman head cover rule.
Even if it is not part of the original text, religions can evolve over time.
The original leader dies and the new leader takes over. The new leader gets a phone call from the gods and they him “New info for you humans. The Moon is made of divine light and you can’t land on it.”
The message can be sent by the gods at anytime. Maybe it was sent as soon as someone walked on the Moon.

I am not going to assume that gods want to provide correct info to humans. Maybe they are all assholes.

Actually, I go with Occam’s Razor. People who claim to get messages from gods probably are deluded ad have brain problems.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: In true spirituality we want to present an empty bowl to God. If you know than you don’t know, than there can be spiritual knowledge.

You seem to be expecting some valid information from gods.
See the 2 lines above.
How are you going to figure out whether the gods are giving you valid info or whether there are gods at all?

7,5)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: First we convince ourselves. When I watch the situation in Israel I sometimes catch myself wondering if they couldn’t just take everything or just blow the entire place with atomic bombs so that we can be done with it. Then there is this voice that acts as a reminder: The only solution there is for everyone to stay put. And then live in the 1967 borders. And focus on more constructive issues.

They are not going to listen to you. Even if leaders from both sides come together and agree to something, some people won’t obey their leaders.
Probably the only person they would listen to is their god and that guy is not going to show up.

For example, there is a certain church that muslims have taken over long ago. I think it is called the Dome of the rock. The jews want it back. The arabs say that it belongs to arabs.
Imagine that. You are talking about people who kill others, take their stuff and they don’t want to give it back. This is a multigenerational thing. The killers have died centuries ago but their descendants walk in their footsteps.
I’m sure that arabs have added stuff to the church but does it make it theirs?

Other solution might be to duplicate the church. Make an exact copy.
Maybe a duplicate of the entire Israel/Palestine could be made.
But then, there is going to be war over who gets the original “atoms”.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: So Atheism is a good thing. Atheists don’t have “The on true answer”. Atheists know they don’t know. But again. These are deep issues.

Atheists would run into the same issues. They can go to war over territory, they might go to war over some ancient building or cultural material.
I think there is more of a chance for atheist cultures to come together and compromise.

8)

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: When Lao-Tse entered a village it is said that the spiritual mood and energy of the entire village would be lifted by his mere presence. So Jesus’s words are mainly for me. The Romans are all gone now. I am taking photos in the ruins of their greatest cities. All of them are now gone and forgotten eons ago. But I am still studying the teachings of Jesus because I think it’s beneficial for me even today.

Matthew 15:21 KING JAMES VERSION
Then Jesus went thence, and departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon. {15:22} And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. {15:23} But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. {15:24} But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. {15:25} Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. {15:26} But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. {15:27} And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table. {15:28} Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.

^^^^^The story is that a woman of cannanite origin comes to Jesus and asks for help because her daughter is ill with a devil. Jesus shows no interest. His disciples have no interest as well and ask Jesus to send her away. The woman begs for help. Jesus reply is basically, why would I take away the bread of the children (the children being the children of Israel) and give it a canannite?

When Jesus says “It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs.”, he seems to be saying that cannites are dogs, they are shit, they are garbage.
Then, the lady convinces him to help the girl.

JESUS’S MISSION
Jesus will help who?
Jesus doesn’t want to help everyone. His mission is to only help Israel.
The canaan woman did some ass kissing and Jesus was pleased so he helped the woman’s daughter.


^^^^^Notice the line:
I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

The line is an indication that the jews were waiting for a savior for a long time ever since Rome conquered Israel. As the years or centuries go by, some will start losing hope and are considered “lost jews”.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Ego based religion is misleading many of us. In the old days there was not so many means of communication so when you had a Terrorist cult leader like Hassan-I-Sabbah (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasan-i_Sabbah) He could not do as much damage as Osama Ben Laden.

OK, but how is a person suppose to decide which class of religions are the ones sent by the god? Is it the ego based religion or the non-ego?
It is possible that you think the non-ego is better but you still need to get the approval of the god somehow.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: Paradise: That’s another deeper theme. Old people described the reward of a pious life as “Heaven” because “Heaven” is so big and limitless. That’s what our true-Self or God is actually. Like the difference between our tiny limited existence and the vast, limitless, all-encompassing universe.

It is pretty simple. All animals find that life is harsh. Being outside is not pleasant. It might be cold, windy, rainy. There is no way to turn off the sensors in the skin. Some animals build a house or live in a cave or in the ground.
Being hungry is not a pleasant feeling. Being chased by a carnivore is not pleasant either.
Getting sick is not pleasant. Getting a cut and having an infection is not pleasant.
For primitive humans, life was very hard as well. There was no modern medicine, no modern dentistry.
The idea of dying wasn’t a pleasant prospect.
Why did my son die? Where did my dead father or grandfather go? Are they just being decomposed in the ground?
Life was a mystery to them. They wanted to know why they exist. They felt like they are intelligent beings and should be above this world, that they don’t belong with the rest of the animals.

So naturally, all cultures are going to develop the idea of an everlasting soul, that goes to some utopia, where you don’t work and you just play.
Naturally, they believe that paradise is for humans. They don’t plan on taking animals with them.
It is only modern man that keeps pets that wants their family animal to be taken with them.

So, there isn’t anything deep about it. It is just a psychological difficulty that humans have with life and death.

Note that the other option is to turn off your pain sensors. Or turn off all your emotions. This world will not bother you anymore. You will be very comfortable, in any setting.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: These places are like schools. Most of the time you have to pay to be there for a given amount of time. Just like in college you take the classes you think are interesting and then you move one with your life.

Sounds ok.

(April 11, 2024 at 10:36 am)Leonardo17 Wrote: People are talking about “Islamist” terrorism. Well guess what? – There is no “Islamic” terrorism. And the IRI is just a name. In my understanding there isn’t an ounce of spirituality in any of these stuff. + these are ethnocentric and even racists terms.

 ISIL should be called “The terrorist group calling itself Islamic-State”, IRI should not be allowed to call itself Islamic (nor even Republic actually).

It is possible that they are upset because someone drew Mohamed, someone burned the Koran, someone said that Islam comes from the devil, a non muslim is walking on holy lands of Islam, someone left Islam.

I hear that the punishment for apostasy in Islam is to kill the apostate.

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