Islam is a Religion of Peace

[wilbur]

Sorry Wilbur you are wrong, the Daily Mail is owned by The Daily Mail and General Trust of which Viscount Rothermere is the majority stockholder and Chairman of the Board, and Martin Morgan is the CEO.

You're right, Rupert Murdoch doesn't own the Daily Mail. My bad. So what's your point anyway? Yes, there are Islamic terrorists.

The US killed over one million people in Iraq, and under false pretenses. But because they were killed with smart bombs and guys in uniform so I guess that was ok? Maybe they were killed humanely (sarcasm intended).

That there is an ISIS in the first place is the result of blowback of US foreign policy. Saudi Arabia has been funding Madrasses (Islamic schools) for the better part of 30 years now throughout the Middle East and Pakistan. The US and Saudi Arabia armed Islamic terrorists in order to overthrow the secular leader of a multi-religious country, Syria, because he happens to be allied with Iran that the US wants overthrown because they don't cowtow to US policy. Then they're dismayed when a force of less than one thousand Islamic fanatics (that they trained and equipped) take over one third of Iraq. As if they never heard of them before. Sorry, the US has been funding Al-Qaida groups since all the way back during the Soviet campaign in Afghanistan.

If this Islamic State takes hold across parts of Syria and Iraq, you will see a whole lot of pain and misery as some of their terrorists fighters go back of their home countries. If they are now so concerned with the welfare of Christians in the Middle East, they better get on Assad's side real quick. If Assad falls, it's going to get even uglier than what is going on now.

A US foreign policy disaster if there ever was one.

 

[Aardvark154]

Wikipedia speaks about the attempt of the Nazi party to form a 3rd major Christian denomination (Catholic, Protestant and Nazi) where Hitler is hailed as a new messiah.

That sounds like Christianity to you?

Of course it isn't and of course the Nazi Party wanted to convert Christianity in Germany into a travesty of itself.

 

[Aardvark154]

I'm confused...

Your argument is that because two churches aren't pushing Christian violence, Christianity can't be interpreted violently? Or is your argument that every Mosque is preaching violence on a weekly basis? Or are you saying there is no church in the world that preaches violence?

I am saying that when Bishop writes that

All religions are religions of peace provided that you are part of that religion, all religions are religions of war provided that you are not part of that religion.

That to take just two mainstream churches in the downtown core of Toronto that statement doesn't hold any water.

 

[asterwald]

After reading a few posts: I have come to the realization there are a LOT of Palestinian Muslims on Terb. And they tend to be the more vocal ones on the forum too.

 

[basketcase]

I think that is a drastic oversimplification. The UN partition plan was rejected, and war broke out. ...

Who rejected it?

And Arabs states controlled the West Bank and Gaza. They could have set up a Palestinian state?

 

[basketcase]

It was European Christians who were responsible for the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust; then they blame the Arabs in the Middle-East for it....

???? That's a new claim. I don't recall seeing any source blaming Arabs for the Holocaust.

 

[basketcase]

..... And then out of nowhere, soldiers came. And not only did they come, they engaged in the wholesale slaughter of Muslims. Peaceful or otherwise, it didn't matter. And this violent action by Christians is the spark that ignited Islam and fueled the flames of discord.

If it weren't for the violence of Christians in history, we may not have violent fringes in Islam today. ...

Wow. Pretty lacking in historical knowledge.

First off, Islam was spread to the Middle East, the Balkans, North Africa, the Mediterranean islands, and Spain through war.

Second, the Islamic world wasn't ever a coherent entity. There has always been multiple sects and interpretations right from the death of Muhammad. During some periods and in some places, there was a fair amount of religious tolerance but at other times there wasn't. And pilgrims routinely were attacked although I'm sure a good part of those attacks was banditry and not religiously motivated.

During the era of the Crusades (and pretty much the rest of history) there were also a continual battles between groups in the Middle East and at a couple points, Salah ad-din's armies were incapacitated by conflicts and rivalries withing the Caliphate. There were also continual struggles between Muslim leaders in Egypt and Baghdad.

Obviously there have been many attacks over the years in the name of Christianity and any other religion but war is not new to Islam, the Middle East, or anyone else. To even hint that Christians brought the idea of violence to Islam is patently lacking in reality.

 

[SkyRider]

After reading a few posts: I have come to the realization there are a LOT of Palestinian Muslims on Terb. And they tend to be the more vocal ones on the forum too.

Yeah, I have no idea why some people are talking about Nazis on a thread about Muslims. Maybe the connection is that Muslims assisted the Nazis in killing Serbs in WW II.

 

[jsanchez]

It's not complicated. Muslims have a long long history of attacking other people and forcing them to convert to Islam. The ancestors of present day Muslims in Egypt, Iran, Malaysia, Indonesia and many other countries were forced to convert to Islam at the point of a sword.
...

This is a myth (re-inforced by ISIS unfortunately). If you had visited Egypt and Syria (in better times), Iraq (back in the days when the USA and Saddam were buddies) or Lebanon, you'd see why. The hundreds of churches and monasteries you'd run into all over the place, and that are in use (and open for visitors) and have been well preserved for centuries, put the lie to that myth. Different muslim empires continuously ruled those lands for centuries, they could've wiped out any trace of christianity if they were really intent on converting the population. However, all they cared about was allegiance and collecting money, much like European medieval kingdoms. As to Malaysia and Indonesia, ask any muslim indonesian or malay and they'll tell you Islam spread there via traders from the indian sub-continent.

 

[jsanchez]

...Islamic extremism seemed to become a force in the mid to late 70s and then exponentially grew out of control from there. It was probably due to the Afghanistan war with russia, after that war was over, they still had money, weapons, and training provided by the US so they all went looking for the next holy war.

Islam would have been more modernized and been mostly castrated like christianity is today had it not been for oil. Arab nations without oil were dirt poor and provided willing martyrs, arab nations that had oil were so rich that they did not have to contend with earning a living so they had the time and money to sponsor holy wars. There are countries in the middle, like Iran, they have a large piece of land and they have a decent amount of oil, not enough oil to make everyone princes but enough that they will never be dirt poor, Iran was the first arab country to have democratic elections, but it was easier to extort oil from a strong man than it is from a democracy so the CIA overthrew the elected leader and installed the shah of Iran, after the shah then everything turned to sh*t.

Prior to the late 70's, it didn't exist outside pockets in Egypt/KSA. Late 70's to early 80's was the turning point, around the time when the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan to prop a communist puppet, while the US brutal puppet in Iran was toppled. Iran had slowly been charting its own course to parliamentary democracy and elected a left-leaning prime minister who wanted to nationalize the iranian oil industry (controlled by the British back then). The USA and Britain didn't quite like that idea and had the CIA and MI6 mount a coup and install the Shah. A puppet king makes more business sense than a freely elected prime minister of an independent oil producing country. Much like WW2 was the result of WW1, the rise of Khomeini and his islamic revolution was the direct result of the events that had taken place earlier in Iran.

 

[wilbur]

???? That's a new claim. I don't recall seeing any source blaming Arabs for the Holocaust.

Actions spoke louder than words. The UN granted the Jews, persecuted in Europe by Europeans, their homeland by taking it away from the Palestinians.

Then, you always hear, especially by those with no clue about history who watch too much Fox News, about centuries of Muslim hate towards Jews, whereas it's the Europeans who regularly persecuted the Jews and ultimately rounded up and gassed 6 million of them in concentration camps.

 

[MattRoxx]

Yeah, I have no idea why some people are talking about Nazis on a thread about Muslims. Maybe the connection is that Muslims assisted the Nazis in killing Serbs in WW II.

It's because Hamas are similar to, but worse than Nazis.

The Hamas Charter’s inclusion and endorsement of the Koranic prophesy that “Allah’s promise” will be fulfilled only when “Muslims will fight the Jews [and kill them],” and their daily, indiscriminate raining of rockets upon the only Jewish state, have prompted many to compare Hamas to the Nazis. But anyone who compares the butchers of Hamas to Nazis owes the Nazis an apology. Even the Nazis built bomb shelters to protect their civilians.

Yes, Hamas is every bit as evil as the Nazis were in their desire to exterminate Jews from the face of the Earth. But what subterranean level of barbarity does it require for a movement wantonly to eschew taking even minimal steps to shield its women and children from the predictable responses to the attacks that Hamas themselves have initiated?

In their willingness, indeed eagerness, to sacrifice thousands of their own people for what amounts to no more – or less – than a macabre publicity stunt to turn world opinion against Israel and gain sympathy for Hamas, for civilian deaths for which Hamas itself is responsible, Hamas has shown itself to be more callous, nihilistic, and inhuman than even the Nazis were.

 

[BlueLaser]

Wow. Pretty lacking in historical knowledge.

First off, Islam was spread to the Middle East, the Balkans, North Africa, the Mediterranean islands, and Spain through war.

Second, the Islamic world wasn't ever a coherent entity. There has always been multiple sects and interpretations right from the death of Muhammad. During some periods and in some places, there was a fair amount of religious tolerance but at other times there wasn't. And pilgrims routinely were attacked although I'm sure a good part of those attacks was banditry and not religiously motivated.

During the era of the Crusades (and pretty much the rest of history) there were also a continual battles between groups in the Middle East and at a couple points, Salah ad-din's armies were incapacitated by conflicts and rivalries withing the Caliphate. There were also continual struggles between Muslim leaders in Egypt and Baghdad.

Obviously there have been many attacks over the years in the name of Christianity and any other religion but war is not new to Islam, the Middle East, or anyone else. To even hint that Christians brought the idea of violence to Islam is patently lacking in reality.

There's a difference between war and slaughter, and the wars in the medieval Muslim world were nowhere near the slaughter the Christians brought. When a city surrenders after a protracted siege, you accept the surrender and the masses inside begin their mass exodus out into exile. Not the crusaders. They killed every single person that wasn't Christian. Surrendering or otherwise. Man, woman or child. The accounts are quite horrific, and it was violence on a scale that very few had ever imagined at the time.

 

[BlueLaser]

That sounds like Christianity to you?

Of course it isn't and of course the Nazi Party wanted to convert Christianity in Germany into a travesty of itself.

Good job grabbing the snippit out of context. Allow me to repost the part you ignored:

The question isn't "Were the Nazis truly Christian?" the question is "Did the Nazis believe themselves to be Christian?" And mostly, they did. Likewise, do extremist Muslims consider themselves Muslim? They do. Do mainstream Muslims? Mostly not.

As far as they were concerned, the masses in the ranks, they were Christians. And part of the reason to get rid of the Jews was more than just anti-Semitic beliefs that the Jews were controlling the money and the governments, part of it was that Jews deserved it for their treatment of Jesus.

Again, you say that these self-professed Christians don't seem very Christian to you and shouldn't to other Christians. I say that these self-professed Muslims don't seem very Muslim to most Muslims. Same argument.

 

[BlueLaser]

Yeah, I have no idea why some people are talking about Nazis on a thread about Muslims. Maybe the connection is that Muslims assisted the Nazis in killing Serbs in WW II.

Maybe you should read the whole thread then. Someone said there is no widespread mass killings perpetrated by Christians and the Nazis were given as an example. That example has been questioned. It makes perfect sense. If you're going to jump into a conversation in the middle, don't be surprised if things don't make sense.

 

[basketcase]

Actions spoke louder than words. The UN granted the Jews, persecuted in Europe by Europeans, their homeland by taking it away from the Palestinians.

Then, you always hear, especially by those with no clue about history....

Actually my views are formed by reading historians. On the Israeli-Arab conflict, I have read Kharsh, Morris, and Khalidi, three historians with very different views from each other.

If you actually took the time to read, the first British partition plan was created in 1937 because there was already a significant Jewish population.

 

[basketcase]

There's a difference between war and slaughter, and the wars in the medieval Muslim world were nowhere near the slaughter the Christians brought. ...

As I said, you should really take the time to read some history (beyond the Eurocentric). The Crusades did not introduce religious slaughter to the Islamic world. They were pretty good at it before hand just like everyone else and there was regular battles between different Muslim sects from the beginning.

 

[BlueLaser]

As I said, you should really take the time to read some history (beyond the Eurocentric). The Crusades did not introduce religious slaughter to the Islamic world. They were pretty good at it before hand just like everyone else and there was regular battles between different Muslim sects from the beginning.

You may want to review what we're talking about here.

You believe my history of the Crusades is Eurocentric.....because I see the Europeans as more violent than the Muslims?

There are many great works on the Crusades that try to label the crusaders as "no worse" than the Muslims that were there, of that we both agree. But in my experience, those ARE the Eurocentric ones. The Arabic scholars are generally more critical. An interesting one worth noting is the non-Eurocentric treatise written by Arabic scholar Dr Abdullah Sindi (Ph.D. international relations) that details, at length, the barbarism of the west. I don't bring him up because he's reputable (he is, afterall, a holocaust denier), I bring him because it shows the Arab view, not the Eurocentric one, is the view most critical of the Crusader's conduct.

I would say that if anyone is ascribing to the Eurocentric view of the Crusades, it's you. In the Middle East and even Eastern Europe, the Crusades are widely seen as the most brutal, savage wars in history. It was nothing short of an attempted Genocide by Christians.

Muslims went to war. I've never said otherwise. But the idea of torturing, raping, pillaging and killing innocents or surrendering enemy was against their rules of war, much as ours is today. Not that it never happened, just like some of that stuff happens today, but it was on a small scale and not condoned by the powers that be. Crusaders, on the other hand, had the complete support of their superiors to do anything they wanted to anyone not of the Christian faith. The history books, both those written by Europeans and those written by Arabs, generally agree with that.

The violence the Christians wrought against Muslims during the Crusades was unmatched in human history at the time. If you want the Eurocentric view, that would be that the Crusades were not an offensive Holy War, but a defensive one in response to Muslim expansion across the Holy Land. That's Eurocentric.

You can try to call someone biased if you want to, but you should make sure that makes sense. The Eurocentric view isn't anti-Europe and pro-Arab, not even when speaking of ancient history like the Crusades. I agree that one of us has a Eurocentric view though...

 

[Aardvark154]

I say that these self-professed Muslims don't seem very Muslim to most Muslims. Same argument.

Given that I've already said that while most Muslims are not extremists, a significant number of Muslims are extremists, and that this is going on today, not a century ago. I'm not sure what point you believe you are making.

One does need to ask where is the Dietrich Bonhoeffer of the Muslim world or is that role left to Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

 

[Aardvark154]

But the idea of torturing, raping, pillaging and killing innocents or surrendering enemy was against [Muslim] rules of war, much as ours is today. Not that it never happened, just like some of that stuff happens today, but it was on a small scale and not condoned by the powers that be.

The Ottoman Turks seemed to do a pretty damn fine job of it from the Fifteenth through the Seventeenth Centuries.