Gambling Muslims

[Anadrol 50]

Isn't it against Islamic law to gamble. Why are there Muslims on the WPT? Are they not religious, or do they consider poker a game of skill ?

[Victor]

Muslims LOVE to gamble. They constitute the majority of the players in the cleveland charity game circuit. There is one particular Muslim festival that runs games twice a year. They have 10 tables and the wait lists for all 3 limits is always 20 names long. People show up 2 hrs before the games even start.

Additionaly, they all suck. They come to gamble and they do just that. Best games in the country.

[ThaSaltCracka]

I think the OP point though is, are these people truely muslims?

[Victor]

Many of the ones I know are.

There are also a lot of Arabic Christians.

[Blarg]

Well, most people in most religions aren't supposed to have sex outside of marriage, either...and we know how rare *cough* that is.

There are some good Muslim players here in Los Angeles. I have seen hardly any without huge egos though, for some reason.

Some people who you'd think are Muslim really aren't, too. Some are Bahai, Christian, etc.

[Leo99]

You can usually tell the Christians from the Muslims based on name alone. I asked a devout Muslim friend about their gambling a couple months ago and he said they're sinning. Now, this guy prays at work everyday, goes to mosque every Friday, fasts all the days of Ramadan, plus 6 extra days the next month, won't buy me a ham sandwich and won't sit with us if we drink alcohol. Other Muslims at work drink beer, fast some of the days of Ramadan and don't go to Mosque on Fridays. I'm sure the drinking Muslims might gamble too.

In answer to your question: Same as a sinning Catholic. Some think they should be thrown out of the church but most just think they're non-religious Catholics.

[Tyler Durden]

I am a gambling Muslim. No joke.

[granny50]

This is a very interesting post. I was a (semi) practicing muslim about 4 years ago when I first came to the US. I never drank, smoked, or even touched a girl other than by mistake. I never went to parties because I hated being the only non-drunk guy. Fast forward 2 years later. My friend asks me if I want to play poker. Before I play, he insists I watch Rounders. I do. I want to play now. I lose my first $10 playing 0.10/0.25 fixed limit holdem. I remember having boat over boat and losing and thinking this game is really hard.
I played another game a week later and lost another $10. My friend gave me a Lee Jones book to read. The next time I played I was the biggest winner. I then started playing online. Now I realized, all these years - not eating pork, fasting, praying (every once in a while, I wasn't devout), and abstinence from alcohol, smoking, drugs, etc would be of no use if I decided to gamble. I know poker is not gambling, but anything that you bet money on irrelative of whether you are a 98% favorite to win is still gambling in the eyes of Islam.
Now, I start doing everything I'm not supposed to do. I drank, I smoked, still haven't done drugs though. But now I dont tell people that I am muslim. If they ask me, I tell them I was brought up Muslim, but I don't really practice anymore.
Oh, and if God(or Allah) can't understand what I'm doing is not gambling and is not detrimental to me, I don't think he deserves my faith.

[Blarg]

If there is a god, I think he's probably a lot nicer than everybody makes him out to be. I can't imagine he wouldn't be embarassed to be the big jerk so many people say he is. He probably has a good laugh at all the nuts who think they know him better than everyone else. Personally, I'd be surprised if he didn't gorge on a few beers while kickin' it up there with Buddha and Odin and Indra and Zeus and Lao Tsu and the rest. They must think we're pretty ridiculous.

At least, that's the only kind of God I could imagine worth of the name.

[Joe826]

i played with a muslim in spokane, wa who was very good. nice guy too. that's the only one i've ever seen playing poker though.

[zaxx19]

Tons of Muslims play poker. It is outlawed in Islam but I see alot of Jewish kids eating cheeseburgers with bacon to. It really is a question of how observant a person is. BTW just as a sidebar the Dradle(you know that spinning top in hannukah) was originally a form of gambling..and when played by children during this holiday is played for "gold coins" of chocolate. So that would mean Stu Ungar was actually a good Jew....errr maybe not but he was a damn good poker player and Jewish. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[daryn]

isn't it dreidel?

aren't you jewish?
















aren't you stupid?

[AngryCola]

He is becoming quite tiresome.

[Cerril]

Very few people take every word of a religion into themselves. Most find many aspects of the philosophy appealing and leave it at that, no matter what the religion. There are some hypocrites out there too, of course. More are just casually religious, however.