The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) seems to spend almost its entire time publishing apologies for Islamic slaughter, killing, terrorism, violence, misogyny, sexual-grooming gangs, and so on. And it usually does so with Islamic taqiyya: lies, prevarications, evasiveness, equivocations, ambiguity, deceit, dishonesty, obfuscation, deception, dissembling and dissimulation (all used to advance and/or protect Islam).

Predictably, in the aftermath of the Islamic slaughter in Peshawar, the MCB has given its own response to the event in a very short piece entitled, 'A Massacre of Children: An Ummah in Shock'. And equally predictably, it quotes the one quote that Muslims always use in such circumstances.

Basically, you hear this passage all the time at Interfaith meetings, in the Guardian, on the BBC, etc. Try Googling the phrase and you'll get literally dozens of links; almost all will be from Muslim or interfaith groups.

This is a passage from the Koran which even many non-Muslims will recognize. The MCB version goes:

“Whosoever kills a human being, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whosoever saves the life of one, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind.”

This quote is a perfect and despicable example of Islamic taqiyya and it is so for many reasons.

What surprises me, however, is that -- after the deceitful nature of this passage has been demonstrated so many times and in so many different places -- Muslims and Islamophiles are still using it. The MCB, for example, must think its non-Muslim supporters/readers are either stupid or even (fellow) liars.

This following is the MCB's lead-up to its citation:

“While it is very hard to find the words to respond to the tragedy before us, I can only quote a verse from the Koran in which it says...”

And then we have the passage itself:

“Whosoever kills a human being, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whosoever saves the life of one, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind.”

(The passage is verse 32 of sura/chapter 5.)

Virtually no religion or ideology believes or accepts what is purported to be the meaning of that Koranic statement. In order to fully accept it, the religion or ideology concerned would have to be fully pacifist in nature (e.g., Jainism or Quakerism); which makes its use by Muslims all the more ironic or even somewhat sick.

This passage -- at least within a MCB and indeed Islamic context -- is at best meaningless (a mere soundbite) and at worse a piece of gross deceit.

The relevant point is that the MCB has cynically removed the middle clause knowing full well that it more or less negates the surrounding clauses. After all, the erased central clause isn't long: it's a mere ten words in length. This, I suggest, is classic Islamic taqiyya or deceit. And no Islamic organization does that better than the Muslim Council of Britain.

Here's the passage in full:

“… We ordained for the Children of Israel that if anyone slew a person – unless it be for murder or spreading mischief in the land [my italics] – it would be as if he slew the whole people.”

Immediately after that, we have:

“And if anyone saved a life, it would be as he saved the life of the whole people. Then although there came to them our messengers with clear signs, yet even after that, many of them continued to commit excesses in the land.”

It can be seen that the opening clause is also always deleted by Muslims when they quote it at non-Muslims. That is, for a while I didn’t even know -- because of the deliberate misquotations from Muslims (or their use of Kitman) -- that the passage begins with the clause: “We [i.e., Allah] ordained for the Children of Israel...” That is followed by: “.... that if anyone slew a person...”.

So not only is this supposedly peaceful -- or even pacifist -- passage not aimed at Muslims in the first place (it was aimed at Jews), on only a tiny bit of analysis it can be seen not to be very peaceful or positive in the first place!

(This well-used passage is from Jewish scripture (Mishnah, Sanhedrin: 4:5) anyway. It was stolen from Jewish sources by Muhammad and his immediate followers (something they often did).

In addition, the passage doesn't appear to have been abrogated like so many other “peaceful verses” in that book. Perhaps this is so precisely because of the surgically removed central clause.)

Here’s another equally-positive translation used by Muslim:

“That whosoever killed a human being, it shall be deemed as though he had killed all mankind.”

The actual version (again) is:

“That whosoever killed a human being, except as punishment for murder or other villainy [sometimes ‘mischief’] in the land, shall be deemed as though he had killed all mankind…”

This, of course, prompts the question: What would be deemed as “villainy” by Muslims?

What about what the Taliban has claimed about the Pakistani Army and others?

Anyway, here’s a list of what has been -- and still is -- classed as “villainy in the land” by millions of Muslims:

apostasy, churches, the possession of Bibles, homosexuality, preaching a religion other than Islam, all criticism of Islam, Muhammad, the Koran, not going to the mosque, sex outside marriage, atheism, Zionism, materialist philosophies and political views, secularism… basically anything non-Islamic and certainly everything anti-Islamic.

Let’s not mess about here.

Millions of Muslims today believe the very existence of people who aren't Muslims -- or lands that aren't Islamic -- are examples of “villainy in the land”.