Explaining This Difference Between ISIS-K and the Taliban

 Ever since the Afghan crisis started up (still continuing, just don't tell Joe that)....I've had this curious nature over the Taliban and their archenemy....the ISIS-K 'team'.

I thought, from a western prospective going back several years....that any team that was pro-Muhammad/Islam was probably friendly with another team that was pro-Muhammad/Islam.  Well....I was wrong.

So after a fair amount of reading....there is this epic saga that I need to lay out.

You see....group 'A' and group 'B' have differing views on the Muhammad Hadith business.  What's a Hadith?  In this period that Muhammad lived (over 1,200 years ago).....various people observed Muhammad, his words, and his actions.....then had Hadiths they wrote up (basically interpretation of what they felt he said or would have said).  Then some others had an opposing Hadith (a differing interpretation of they felt he said or did).  

Down one path went the Taliban, and down the opposing path went ISIS-K.

The ISIS-K crowd?  They have this 'story' which concerns a end-of-the-world prophecy (yeah, kinda like those Christian folks who have the Revelations chapter to deal with).

This 'story' basically concerns a battle, where true Muslims (not pretender Muslims or fake Muslims) will fight the epic final battle against the evil non-Muslims.

There's a video existing....fine propaganda-like story, which tells this story over how things will be at Dabiq, Syria.....where things will come to a close.  

Dabiq in reality?  It's a fairly green valley area in northern Syria...maybe 10 miles from the Turkish border.  Folks there mostly farm.  Maybe 3,000 residents in the whole district, and most would describe the area as a pretty quiet place.

How Dabiq ever got onto the legend business of some epic soon-to-be battle?  Well....it simply got onto a Hadith and no one really stood there to ask questions.  

I will admit....around 500 years ago, some battle did occur there already, but this was a Turk-versus-Mamluk Sultanate group.  The Sultanate group?  It's an oddball group composing of a minimum of seven ethnic groups (Crimeans, Greeks, and Albanians among the group).  Certainly not crusader types unless you really stretch the meaning.

So you stand back and look at this landscape.  In some funny way....the Taliban guys are regarded as not full-up Muslim folks.  The ISIS-K group?  They see only themselves as full-up members.

All of this leading back to various Hadiths....are basically lectures of what people felt Muhammad meant by this and that?  More or less.