The Middle East used to have huge plague outbreaks. The original reason for not having a "pesky" dog in the house may have been an enlightened health practice.
People typically got plague from handing flea-infested livestock and dogs. If the dog is in the home, his fleas get on the people's clothing and bedding.
You can find evidence of plague spreading from livestock and dogs to soldiers in the Iliad. The Greeks used to sacrifice their livestock to the god Apollo (the god who caused place). This was to propitiate Apollo, but burning the livestock DID stop the plague because it killed the fleas and infected animals.
The Black Plague in Europe was a bit different and seems to have spread from person to person contact. It killed at leaste 30% of the population and took hundreds of years to recover from. In the ME, it was usually animals and their fleas that gave people plague. The worst plage is from marmots in Asia.
The prohibition against pork for both Muslims and Jews is similar. There were good health reasons.
In America where we have vetinerians and better sanitation, such a passage might be seen in a more modern light: Muslims should be clean and follow enlightened health and sanitation practices.
This rule about the dogs was a very good rule AT THAT TIME.
Perhaps it could be reinterpreted for our times as showing that Mohammed wants people to follow good health and sanitation practices.
I have a dog. She is a pest and a pig! I keep her as protection from Al Qaeda:)
She eats my food if I turn my back, wrecks my furniture, and pees on the floor. She costs a fortune at the vet, too. She gets skin infections sometimes and has to have surgery because she eats pins off the floor.
Well, I have been stuck with this "pesky" dog for 12 years. And she and her fleas have kept me safe from Al Qaeda so far. However, she was hospitable to the burglars we had once.
Islam is not too off-base about dogs, IMHO!
Correct previous post to read that Apollo was the god who caused plague. (In their religion).
I am not Muslim, but I think that there is a very important role for educated Muslim scholars. They need to help their people reinterprete their scriptures in a contemporary context. There are passages in the Koran about tolerance. Mohammed said, "There is no compulsion in religion."
Many middle-class American Muslim families let their girls make a personal decision about wearing a head scarf or not, and the girls are educated and have good professional careers. Young Muslim teenaged girls I know are very modest and good students.
The way it is now in the ME, anyone can claim to be an expert and repress other Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Christians.
Bin Laden is not a scholar of Islam. Neither are the Taliban.