I think you're begging the question there. I've read the Qur'an (in M.A.S. Abdel Haleem's English translation), and I found it the most unpersuasive religious writing I've ever seen. It consists almost entirely of exhortations to believe in the greatness of Allah, and promises of heaven for those who do and destruction for those who do not. Believe, submit, pray, and destroy your enemies -- and that's it. There are few exemplary tales (the only one I recall is that of Moses and Khidr), and no moral teachings beyond "believers are your friends, infidels are your enemies."
I haven't read the hadith, but skimming this site, they are mostly about rituals of cleanliness and prayer, and legalistic matters, expressed in the form of vignettes of Muhammad's life. And of course the whole method of determining the truth of anything by inspecting the exact words of people who lived and died centuries ago is absurd.
But I've never been a Moslem. What was it like, for you? Have I mischaracterised it?
I've read the Qur'an [...]]no moral teachings beyond "believers are your friends, infidels are your enemies."
What, all of it? Then surely you have forgotten, say, this fragment which is about morals and nothing else (and which I had to learn by heart in school). The bits that are purely about "join me and you will be rewarded, oppose me and you will be punished" are mostly of the Mecca era, when the Islamic community was weak and getting killed and tortured and ostracised and embargoed by everyone. Establishing creed and promoting ho...
(It's my first time posting an article, so please go easy on me.)
I wonder if anyone ever fully analysed the Qran and all the resources it uses to tug at the feelings of the reader? It is a remarkably persuasive (if not at all convincing) book, even if I say so myself as an ex Muslim. I've started recognizing some patterns since I started reading this site, but I'd like to know if there is a full-blown, complete, exhaustive deconstruction of that book, that is not dripped in islamophobia, ethnocentrism, and other common failures I have seen in Western theologians when applied to Islam. Not a book about "How the Qran is evil" or "How the Qran is Wrong" or "How IT'S A FAAAKE" but "How, precisely, it manipulates you". Can anyone here point me towards such a work?
And where is the markup help in this blog? I can't seem to find it and it frustrates the hell out of me when I'm commenting usual posts.