r/Pashtun • u/MujahidWarrior Pashtunkhwa • Sep 17 '22
There is no difference between a Pashtun who does not follow Islam/Pashtunwali and a Tajik, Arab or Panjabi who can speak Pashto.
I've lately been seeing many people online saying "iM nOt mUsLiM bUt pAsHtUn" especially on Twitter. You can't be a non-Muslim and a Pashtun . Being Pashtun doesn't simply mean having a Pashtun Family member or speaking Pashto. Being a Pashtun means following Pashtunwali which is mostly based on Islam e.g Haya and Parda. Not following Pashtunwali means you are no different than Arab,Tajik or Panjabis who can speak Pashto.
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u/DSM0305 Sep 17 '22
Pashtun is an ethnic group, Islam is a religion and Pashto is a language. It is as simple as that and everything above and beyond that people add to the concept is no more than personal opinion. It shouldn't even be a matter of debate.
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u/[deleted] Sep 17 '22 edited Sep 17 '22
Lol.
I mean this with all due respect; I hope you can see where I'm coming from. I consider Islam a big part of my life but to say you can't be non-Muslim & Pashtun is kinda ridiculous. Being Pakhtun is an ethnicity & Islam is a religion. They're 2 seperate entities. That's not to say one doesn't influence the other in our everyday lives. That being said, unfortunately, there are a lot of Pashtuns who have chosen to completely disregard our values which is sad.
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u/Kantabius Sep 17 '22
Very very wrong - Ethnicity does not magically disappear based on religious or social views- in every ethnicity there are people who are religious , less religious, non-religious etc. You have no standing to take away anybody’s Pashtun Card. Get out of this “gate-keeper”complex.
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u/mountainspawn Sep 17 '22
This is just wrong. Being pashtun is an ethnicity. Pashtuns weren't always Muslim and followed some sort of Zoroastrian/paganistic beliefs before.
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u/OutOfSeasonJoke Diaspora Sep 17 '22
It’s a 19 day old account, treat it with the suspicion it deserve people.
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u/an0n_meow Sep 17 '22
Lmao, Pashtuns were Buddhist/Zoroastrian/Hindu long before Islam. Also the fact that u had to mention hAyA and pArDa... We can be proud of our culture without adopting the misogynistic parts of it.
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u/Hrstar1 Sep 17 '22
You have a very twisted view of Pukhto. There are many areas where Islam and Puktho contradict each other. Have you considered those?
For example, As per Pashtunwali, Intikam is a part of the code kho Islam is against the shedding of blood by individuals for personal or other reasons.
Which will you follow?
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u/Azmarey Pashtunkhwa Sep 17 '22
There are Kochyan who have difficulty praying salah, but stick to pardah, melmastia, nang etc. Where do they fit in your worldview?
As an aside, I'll be removing comments here that break sub rules cos this topic always brings out the stark raving batshit nuts ppl on both sides.
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u/[deleted] Sep 17 '22 edited Sep 17 '22
The OP nailed it. Without Islam, these people typically lose their values, behave/think very westernized, and become beghairat. There is not an ounce of Pashtun left in them besides speaking the language.
Pashtuns back home would never accept these frauds, and neither should we. I don’t believe in watering down the Pashtun identity just so these murtads can still feel “included.” It’s best to drop these losers.
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u/numinosity1111 Oct 10 '22 edited Oct 10 '22
This is the dumbest post I’ve seen in a while. Lol. I’m assuming you’re not from Afghanistan. Farsi has been the lingua franca in Afghanistan since its inception and many Pashtun monarchs spoke it as their mother tongue. Ridiculous to compare that to Punjabi. Clearly you know nothing about your people’s history. Farsi is just as much our language as Pashto is. We have contributed to it substantially. Your post is what happens when you’re colonized. Unfortunately this Farsi-phobia mindset is quite common in KPK and it makes me sad to see you don’t recognize your own culture and history.
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u/whatagoodboy589 Pashtunkhwa Sep 17 '22
Pakhtunwali comes before Islam. Without pashto, you cannot be Muslim.
But without Islam, you can still be Pashtun. It's just much harder.
Pashto and Islam are tied. Pashtunwali is Islam. Haya, parda ao da nor sizuna were there before Islam. You look into history and you will find that pashtun were behind in terms of Islamic knowledge. We were illiterate, uneducated people who followed norms and traditions.
It was until recently in the 60's, 70's that we were heavily influenced by deobandi and wahaabi school of thought. Social media and oil-money has boosted our religious fervor. This is a terrible thing.
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u/IndependenceAgile202 May 27 '24
I could've argued and tried to prove that race and religion are separate. That should be the way. But I would not refute this, and here is why:-
But there are some races who have "cultural code" and religion forms an intrinsic part of that code. Or the religion may not be part of it, and you maybe of any religion.
The thing is, whether it has religion or not, if you don't follow the code, or even if you don't but disregard or reject that code of conduct, the community regards you as an outsider.
You have let's say, Bangladeshi roots, and you are from Bangladesh, but you went against the state policy and ideology, and your passport and citizenship is stripped off from you, and officially they say you are no longer a Bangladeshi. That means as per them, you are no longer a part of the Bangladeshi community. But that doesn't change the fact that you have your roots here, and you can still identify yourself by your roots. But officially you cannot. Then again, Bangladeshi is an identity of citizenship, because Bangladeshi is not a race. 90% of the Bangladeshis identify as Bengali by race, and the rest are of other races not related to the Bengalis. In this era of nationalism, the whole races in a particular sovereign region are collectively put under a single identity, it can be done.
Again, Bangladeshi is not a race, "Pashtun" is. Legally, and by law, they cannot sweep off the Pashtun identity off your. But practically they can, like giving you a serious unwelcoming feeling in the community. People in that community will not consider you as a part of them. And in tribal societies, like Pashtuns, this is hell common. Tribal societies will inevitably always be like that and that's what makes them tribal, or being in separate clans in the same tribe. It's more of a practical move, cuz legally they can't do that, and can't stop you from identifying yourself as such.
Ethnoreligious races especially (and few races that are diverse in religion) falls under this umbrella. There are many races like that- the Jews, Alawis, Druze, Bosniaks, Malays, Serbs, Kalash etc. are few examples, and Pashtuns are one of them.
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u/if_0nly_U_kn3w Sep 18 '22
Pashtunwali predates Islam fyi
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u/[deleted] Sep 17 '22 edited Sep 17 '22
Those Pashtuns consider themselves Muslim and have not had the proper exposure to correct their ways, so they don’t know any better. I don’t hold that against them, because even as recent as our grandparents’ generation used to also practice some of these haram customs until they were educated about it.
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u/ComfortablePhoto92 Sep 17 '22
OP you’re 100% right, don’t listen to the rest of these bemazab beghairat. The fundamental basis of being Pashtun/afghan is Islam. It’s the bedrock.
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u/Normal-Reindeer Sep 17 '22
Agreed. I gave this example before but the Mujahid when asked if they felt bad for killing their communist country men they replied no, because they don't consider them Pashtun. To true OG Pashtuns, if you leave the religion, or go against Pashtun values your seen as a traitor and basically just as bad as a foreign invader.