Contending with Islam — Time for a Modern Black Robe Regiment and Muslim Accountability

It is not appropriate to label all, or even the majority of those, who question Islam and Muslims as Islamophobes.

CAIR Report 2013, Legislating Fear: Islamophobia and its Impact in the United States, p. ix

Are you concerned about the teachings of Islam that are hostile toward non-Muslims and incompatible with the U.S. Constitution?  Are you concerned that there are Muslim groups and individuals who act on those teachings and kill non-Muslims?  Are you concerned that folks in leadership positions across the United States either don’t understand, or don’t want to understand those teachings of Islam?

Well, here are two things not to do:

First, don’t call for the general banning of Sharia Law.  Sharia Law includes such things as dietary restrictions, personal hygiene matters, financial transactions, and marriage.  What would be the basis for banning these?  And such a call just gives folks on the other side something to use against you.  On the other hand, other aspects of Sharia Law, such as polygamy by men, stoning for adultery, and beheading for apostasy, are already illegal in the United States.

Second, don’t claim that Islam is not a religion and therefore can be banned in the United States.  Here are three reasons why:

1. The “Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom” was a law passed by the Virginia General

Assembly in 1786 that protected the rights of its citizens to worship as they chose.  The bill was originally drafted by Thomas Jefferson in 1779.  Some years after the passage of the Statute, Jefferson wrote that during the earlier debate in the General Assembly there had been an effort to limit the protection to Christians.  However, this effort was defeated, showing that, as Jefferson noted, “it’s protection of opinion was meant to be universal.”  He wrote:

Where the preamble declares that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the word “Jesus Christ,” so that it should read “a departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion” the insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of it’s [sic] protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every denomination.[1]

This Statute “would go on to play a critical role in the development of American religious freedom and the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.”[2]  It would follow then, that the Establishment Clause was also intended to be “universal,” meaning it included Islam.

2. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11^th Edition) defines Islam as “the religious faith of Muslims.”
3. On p. 1 of the Internal Revenue Service publication titled “Tax Guide for Churches and Religious Organizations,” we find:

The term church is found, but not specifically defined, in the Internal Revenue Code (IRC). The term is not used by all faiths; however, in an attempt to make this publication easy to read, we use it in its generic sense as a place of worship including, for example, mosques and synagogues.

Islam is a religion protected by the Establishment Clause, so let’s contend with it as a religion.

During our Revolutionary War, the Black Robe Regiment came into being.  This wasn’t a literal regiment of soldiers, but was rather a term that referred to the

…influential clergymen who promoted American independence and supported the military struggle against Britain. By encouraging the Patriot cause, those ministers helped muster critical support among members of their congregation—support the British begrudgingly acknowledged as vital to maintaining the colonists’ frustrating resistance to British attempts to restore Parliamentary rule… the Black Robe Regiment was not an actual detachment in the Continental Army but rather a British epithet for the influence preachers exerted in support of the Patriot cause.[3]

It’s time for a modern Black Robe Regiment to contend with Islam.  So how is this to be done?

Pastors, start out by speaking against the hatred and violence being taught and advocated in mosques and at Muslim events across the United States.  In March of this year, I completed a report showing examples of this hatred and violence being taught and advocated between October 2023 and February 2025 in 153 Muslim American mosques and events in 28 States and Washington DC.[4]

I found the following themes occurring in the rhetoric among these 153 Muslim American events:

1. Hostility toward Israel and calls for its destruction.
2. Hostility toward Jews and Christians and calls for their death.
3. Great antipathy toward the United States.
4. The lauding of designated foreign terrorist organizations and individual terrorists.
5. Praise for the terrorist organization Hamas’ October 7, 2023, atrocity-filled attack mainly on Israeli civilians.[5]

This rhetoric in Muslim mosques and events is monitored and reported on a regular basis by the folks at MEMRI (www.memri.org).  Pastors, start holding the imams and other Muslim leaders accountable for what is taught and advocated in their mosques and at their events.  Would you stay silent if a fellow Christian pastor was teaching and advocating such things?

Pastors must also start speaking out about the Muslim slaughter of, and atrocities committed on their fellow Christians, especially in Africa and the Middle East. Jihad Watch covers this on a regular basis and provides you with all the tragic facts you need here.

Are you hesitant to say anything because you have heard that this slaughter and the attendant atrocities are being carried out by “radicals” who have “distorted the peaceful religion of Islam”?  After noting a few examples of these incidents, Ibrahim pointed out:

These incidents — while only a fraction of the whole — illustrate a critical point: The groups in question have little, if anything, to do with each other. They are based in widely different countries across sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and East Asia. They differ in race, language, and sociopolitical context.  What they do have in common is their religion: Islam, which directs them to kill Christians… Recognizing that these disparate terror groups are in fact ideologically unified by Islam is considered taboo… The uncomfortable but necessary truth is that Islam — not this or that terrorist group — provides the ideological framework that inspires hostility and violence against non-Muslims. Unless this reality is faced head-on, the cycle of denial will only continue — along with the persecution and loss of countless lives.[6]

Pastors, are you still uncertain about whether the religion of Islam really supports this slaughter and attendant atrocities?  Then read the three-part article I wrote showing the Islamic Doctrinal support for the murder and atrocities committed by the terrorist group Hamas when they invaded Israel on October 7, 2023.[7]  October 7th was the teachings of Islam on display.

It is also time for Pastors and folks reading this article to start holding Muslims accountable for what their religion teaches.  When you do so, keep in mind, just because a Muslim claims not to follow or believe in a particular teaching of Muhammad or command from Allah, it does not mean that teaching or command is invalid.  In the first place, Islam prohibits a Muslim from disagreeing with Allah or Muhammad.[8]  And in the second place, despite that lack of belief by the individual Muslim, that teaching or command is still a valid doctrine of Islam to which that Muslim can return anytime he/she wants.

One way of holding Muslims accountable, with the focus being on Muslim elected and public officials, is to go to my Muslim Oath Project website (https://www.liberato.us/muslim-oath-project.html).  Here I reported on the results of asking 263 Muslim public officials and candidates in 30 different states and Washington DC to choose between the U.S. Constitution/American Law and Islamic Doctrine by answering Four Questions; 246 would not express support for the U.S. Constitution.  Click on the link for the Four Questions brochure;[9] download it, print and hand it out, and ask these questions of Muslim public officials and candidates.  Let them know that when it comes to a choice between the U.S. Constitution/American Law and Islamic Doctrine, you expect them to publicly support the U.S. Constitution/American Law over Islamic Doctrine.[10]

We must also hold Muslims accountable for the teachings of Islam by focusing on the teachings and example of their prophet Muhammad.  Koran 33:21 states that Muhammad is the model for Muslims to follow if they want to get into paradise.  Below are six topics to focus on.  Each has a link to a specific report that includes numerous writings by authoritative Muslim scholars, who lived from the 8^th through the 21^st Centuries, that provide shocking details about the reality of Muhammad; many of these details were reported a number of times by different scholars over the centuries.  And most of these writings were translated into English by Muslims and published by Muslim publishing houses.

Can you trust this information about Muhammad?  The answer is “Yes.”  Muhammad said numerous times that anyone who told a lie about him would go to Hell.[11]  These Muslim scholars, translators and publishing houses we are relying on were surely aware of this and had no interest in creating and/or repeating lies about Muhammad.  So, one can either dismiss our authoritative Muslim scholars as merely writers of blasphemous fiction who are in Hell or on their way and assert that our Muslim translators and publishers have joined in with that blasphemy and journey, or we can accept that these reports about Muhammad are accurate.  The evidence supports the second choice.

1. Muhammad Married a Six-Year-Old Girl.[12]
2. Muhammad Beheaded 600 Jews in One Day.[13]
3. Muhammad Was a Slave Owner and Slave Dealer.[14]
4. Muhammad Distributed Captured Non-Muslim Women Among His Muslim Warriors and Allowed the Women to be Raped.[15]
5. Muhammad Ordered the Torture and Killing of Non-Muslims.[16]
6. Muhammad Was Married to 11 Women, 9 at One Time.[17]

And Muhammad is a model for Muslims to emulate?

It’s time to get out of our comfort zones and act.  Remember, just because you ignore Islam doesn’t mean Islam will ignore you.

AUTHOR

Stephen M. Kirby

Dr. Stephen M. Kirby is the author of six books and numerous articles about Islam. His latest book is Islamic Doctrine versus the U.S. Constitution: The Dilemma for Muslim Public Officials.

SOURCES:

[1]           Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson 1743 – 1790 (New York and London: G.P. Putnam’s and Sons, 1914), p. 71, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i79lqq5WubliPV5vw21S6DVVFEaGqIH8/view?usp=sharing.

[2]           “Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom,” https://www.monticello.org/research-education/thomas-jefferson-encyclopedia/virginia-statute-religious-freedom/.

[3]           “Black-Robed Regiment,” Teachinghistory.org, https://teachinghistory.org/history-content/ask-a-historian/24635.

[4]           This report is available at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1601VY3s9I6QQ18v91ycGU9BapPjbpoXp/view.

[5]           See my article “What is going on at Muslim American Mosques and Events?” Jihad Watch, March 10, 2025, https://jihadwatch.org/2025/03/what-is-going-on-at-muslim-american-mosques-and-events.

[6]           Raymond Ibrahim, “ISIS Extremism or Islamic Doctrine?” July 21, 2025, https://www.raymondibrahim.com/2025/07/21/isis-extremism-or-islamic-doctrine/.

[7]           “HAMAS on October 7th: The Teachings of Islam on Display”

Part 1 – March 1, 2024, https://www.jihadwatch.org/2024/03/hamas-on-october-7th-the-teachings-of-islam-on-display-part-1

Part 2 – March 2, 2024, https://www.jihadwatch.org/2024/03/hamas-on-october-7th-the-teachings-of-islam-on-display-part-2

Part 3 – March 3, 2024, https://www.jihadwatch.org/2024/03/hamas-on-october-7th-the-teachings-of-islam-on-display-part-3

[8]           See, for example, the following Koran verses:

Chapter 4, Verse 115: And whoever contradicts and opposes the Messenger (Muhammad) after the right path has been shown clearly to him, and follows other than the believers’ way, We shall keep him in the path he has chosen, and burn him in Hell – what an evil destination!

Chapter 33, Verse 36: It is not for a believer, man or woman, when Allah and His Messenger, have decreed a matter that they should have any option in their decision.  And whoever disobeys Allah and His Messenger, he has indeed strayed into a plain error.

Chapter 59, Verse 7: …And whatsoever the Messenger (Muhammad) gives you, take it; and whatsoever he forbids you, abstain (from it).  And fear Allah; verily, Allah is Severe in punishment.

And comment by Muhammad:

It was narrated from Ibn ‘Abbas that the Messenger of Allah said: “Whoever denies a Verse of the Qur’an, it is permissible to strike his neck (i.e. execute him)…”

Muhammad bin Yazeed ibn Majah Al-Qazwini, Sunan Ibn Majah, trans. Nasiruddin al-Khattab (Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: Darussalam, 2007), Vol. 3, No. 2539, p. 455.

[9]           https://islamseries.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/islamic-doctrine-versus-the-u.s.-constitution-four-questions-for-muslim-public-officials-and-candidates.pdf

[10]         Some will say “So what?  Islam allows Muslims to lie to non-Muslims.”  That is true, but see the response to this by “Liberato” – “Answering the Armchair Critics – ‘Why Bother? They Just Lie,’”  http://www.liberato.us/take-action.html.

[11]         For Example:

It was narrated that Abu Qatadah said: “While he was on this pulpit, I heard the Messenger of Allah saying: ‘Beware of narrating too many Ahadith from me.  Whoever attributes something to me, let him speak the truth faithfully.  Whoever attributes to me something that I did not say, let him take his place in Hell.’”

Sunan Ibn Majah, Vol. 1, No. 35, p. 96.

…Ibn ‘Abbas who said: “Allah’s Messenger, Allah bless him and give him peace, said: ‘Avoid reporting anything from me other than what you know, for whoever lies about me shall be in hell fire; and whoever lies about the Qur’an shall enter hell fire.’”

Abu’l-Hasan ‘Ali ibn Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Ali al-Wahidi, Al-Wahidi’s Asbab al-Nuzul, trans. Mokrane Guezzou (Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2008), p. 2.

[12]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/16kLsZbGtrHRRA7ltdgjJL5g_iJWVsC32/view?usp=sharing

[13]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZJXeturH2BoV-UyFnlcfzkREl0Z-ORVY/view?usp=sharing

[14]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zF-SgZIerx8001Fcrax2GybupTQqtZDY/view?usp=sharing

[15]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZYzJDw6b3hF57d4CwuBMu7CcK06IaaqT/view?usp=sharing

[16]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M8dcDy2dxMB1xQYhoaWmHfwYbRzXSgfQ/view?usp=sharing

[17]         https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PGCQBx8V8UOF6QUQypI_O7N4WU8nAnmo/view?usp=sharing

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

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