Who Will Murder to Get Them? The answer is below.
Does the Koran really promise Islamic martyrs 72 virgins? Beginning with the September 11th suicide/homicide bombers who destroyed themselves and thousands of others, there has been talk that the murderers of so many expected their reward to be seventy-two virgins in paradise. Is this a true interpretation of the Muslim faith? Is there any Koranic basis for believing that those who kill and die for the faith will be gifted by Allah with three score and twelve comely virgins?
The difficulty in determining what the Koran has to say about virgins is establishing what the Koran says about anything, period. Translations vary widely. In a Web-based version of Islam’s holy book (www.unn.ac.uk/societies/islamic/index.htm) there is: “Verily, for the Muttaqun [righteous], there will be a success (paradise); gardens and grapeyards; and young full-breasted (mature) maidens of equal age; and a full cup (of wine)” (An-Naba 78:31-34). Other translations replace “full-breasted maidens” with less voluptuous words such as “companions.” The Arabic word at issue is WakawaAAiba, which appears nowhere else in the Koran. The French usually translate that word as des belles aux seins arrondis, which is literally “beautiful women with round breasts.”
The actual number of virgins allotted to the faithful, seventy-two, is found nowhere in the Koran. For this promise Muslims must read the Hadith, traditional sayings traced to Muhammad. Hadith number 2,562, known as the Sunan al-Tirmidhi reads, “The least [reward] for the people of Heaven is 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome of pearls, aquamarine and ruby.”
It is anyone’s guess as to what the holy Prophet of Islam had on his mind when he made such promises to his followers. Was he only appealing to any normal man’s eternal lust? I, a woman, will take the 80,000 servants perhaps, if that is what they really are; servants who are paid well and treated with respect. However, if “servants” in the Hadith, translates in reality to “enslaved persons,” then that Heaven or Paradise where lives the holy Allah does not sound appealing to me. And why would I want seventy-two wives, anyway; or seventy-two concubines, as that is what they likely are? Oh, I forgot that Allah was speaking only to men. Women I suppose, receive the glory of being one of the seventy-two virgins.
As is typical of the American left, those erudite secularists amongst us, they see this heavenly reward of virgins given for murder as no fault of Islam. Long before Muhammad was even born, it was Jesus Christ who came a-teaching in the land about a heavenly Paradise. Muhammad was only accepting the teachings of the prophet Jesus, therefore, the murdering of innocent Jews and Christians so that Muslim men can obtain their Allah-promised seventy-two virgins in Paradise is all the fault of … Christianity.
There are words to describe followers of any religion who would take innocent human life to satisfy their own lusts for virgins, heavenly or earthly, and the words are “murderous sexual perverts.” That is the same phrase that is already applied to persons who commit the same horrific deeds, but not in the name of Allah, to satisfy their sexual perversions on earth.
Kerfuffles and Flourishes 
Actually that “myth” might come from near-death experiences, and the spiritual realms that prophets often are in touch with.
Take a look at my blog on this subject.
I think if terrorists knew what was REALLY in store for scaring and killing people, if they knew how JUSTICE is served in the spiritual realms, you wouldn’t see this distortion of faith.
Check it out:
http://christianliberal.wordpress.com/2008/09/12/on-terrorism-martyrs-and-virgins-oh-my/
Example:
“The first thing I saw was my angry childhood. I saw myself torturing other children, stealing their bicycles or making them miserable at school. One of the most vivid scenes was of the time I picked on a child at grade school because he had a goiter that protruded from his neck. The other kids in the class picked on him too, but I was the worst. At the time I thought I was funny. But now, as I relived this incident, I found myself in his body, living with the pain that I was causing. This perspective continued through every negative incident in my childhood, a substantial number to be sure. From fifth to twelfth grade, I estimate I had at least six thousand fistfights. Now, as I reviewed my life in the bosom of the Being, I relived each of those altercations, but with one major difference: I was the receiver.”
– Dannion Brinkley, Saved by the Light