"Islam is violent! Just read the Koran to see for yourself!"

[Bill3000]

The violence in the Old Testament is a clear example of how outdated it is, considering the total anti-violence message of Christ. The Old Testament is simply kept as a history book IMO - no true Christian would use the teachings there.

Christianity gets its legitimacy from the fact that Jesus julfilled the prophecies of the Messiah, which are taken from the Old Testament. To call it simply a history book is to ruin the point of it, and is highly antinomianist. Besides, Judaism doesn't have the same interpretation of it as Christians do.

 

[El_Machinae]

Now that was condemned by God. You can't use that as a legitimate example.

Samuel told the soldiers to kill babies.

Allegedly, that message was from God. If so, God has set up a morality system where prophets can tell you to kill babies and it would be GOOD for you to do so.

It's the only example you really need to condemn the morality system of the entire Bible, because it's so aggregious.

It perfectly justifies the actions of anyone who commit some offense because they think that a) God told them to or b) someone they deem to be a prophet told them to. If we're to believe the Bible, we cannot morally condemn someone who says "I thought God told me to!".

Stabbing. Babies.

 

[Phlegmak]

It perfectly justifies the actions of anyone who commit some offense because they think that a) God told them to or b) someone they deem to be a prophet told them to. If we're to believe the Bible, we cannot morally condemn someone who says "I thought God told me to!".

Ah! Thank you again, El_Machinae. You've stated something I wanted to say but forgot to.

That is:

It's hard to condemn Muslims for actually following their holy book literally since it clearly says doing some horrible things is ok. The Bible has tremendous evil in it too, and one day, probably in our lifetimes, people will also use the violence in the Bible to justify their own horrible actions.

 

[PrincepsAmerica]

Samuel told the soldiers to kill babies.

Allegedly, that message was from God. If so, God has set up a morality system where prophets can tell you to kill babies and it would be GOOD for you to do so.

It's the only example you really need to condemn the morality system of the entire Bible, because it's so aggregious.

It perfectly justifies the actions of anyone who commit some offense because they think that a) God told them to or b) someone they deem to be a prophet told them to. If we're to believe the Bible, we cannot morally condemn someone who says "I thought God told me to!".

Stabbing. Babies.

This is my one big problem with the old testament, and to an extent, traditional Christianity as a whole. The general consensus is that God is good and hence cannot do something against his nature. How then could he order humans to do what is inherently evil? Either the Bible is not inerrant and the Israelites only thought it was his will or the God of the Bible is a God of arbitrary right and wrong, who could in fact have made a world where killing innocent children is right. Which goes against the previous consensus as best outlined by Aquinas. I wish I knew how he overcame this dilemma.

 

[puglover]

Becky Fisher wants to make killing machines out of Christian children, Osama Bin Laden wants Muslim people to attack against Christians. What's the big difference? Iraqi people are as innocent as Americans.

Honestly, you would judge her based on what she wants to do? That just makes her crazy, not homicidal.

Christianity gets its legitimacy from the fact that Jesus julfilled the prophecies of the Messiah, which are taken from the Old Testament. To call it simply a history book is to ruin the point of it, and is highly antinomianist. Besides, Judaism doesn't have the same interpretation of it as Christians do.

Good post.

Samuel told the soldiers to kill babies.

Allegedly, that message was from God. If so, God has set up a morality system where prophets can tell you to kill babies and it would be GOOD for you to do so.

It's the only example you really need to condemn the morality system of the entire Bible, because it's so aggregious.

It perfectly justifies the actions of anyone who commit some offense because they think that a) God told them to or b) someone they deem to be a prophet told them to. If we're to believe the Bible, we cannot morally condemn someone who says "I thought God told me to!".

Stabbing. Babies.

And I can't say anything more than God sees more than we do, sees the consequences of every action. For us to judge God's actions is to place our viewpoint above his, which doesn't make sense. Faith in his plan is one of the central pillars of our belief system.

 

[Bill3000]

Good post.

Yeah, but it's the fact that he does not fulfill the prophecies, as well as the dichotomy between antinomianism and consistency, such as what El_Mach gave as an example, that makes me a hard atheist towards Christianity.

 

[puglover]

Yeah, but it's the fact that he does not fulfill the prophecies that makes me a hard atheist towards Christianity.

Well, that's where we part ways then I suppose.

 

[Hitti-Litti]

Honestly, you would judge her based on what she wants to do? That just makes her crazy, not homicidal.

Osama has already done it, the difference is that Becky hasn't done it yet. Bin Laden started earlier, that gives him the advantage.

 

[Winner]

The statement in the title of the thread is true. Islam is indeed inherently violent. However, if you've read the Bible, you should know that the Bible is overflowing with violence, plenty of it ordered by god. So obviously, Christianity is inherently violent as well.

Today, the majority of Christians and Muslims are obviously not violent. That's easy to see, since 51% of the people you see around you don't go around hitting other people, or killing other people on a daily basis, or wishing to kill people on a daily basis. (I would add though that the Christians in favor of war are indeed proviolence, but I think that's much less than 51% of Christians, and I think the proviolence of these people isn't related to religion.)

Anyway, Christians will eternally have trouble criticising Muslims as being violent. Any Christian who says, "Hey, look at the Koran! It's got violence in it!" will have to then defend the Bible. The Bible is loaded with violence, so anyone can say, "Hey, did you notice what the Bible says?" (I'm ignoring the fact that this is a bad argument tactic. That's a different subject.)

The good thing about these holy books is that people don't truly follow them. Isn't that nice? All this talk about the Koran and the Bible being good guides for morality is completely useless! They're both incredibly poor guides for morality. Generally what people do is only follow parts of either book, and reject the rest. Because people do that, that clearly and obviously shows that those books are just not good guides for morality.

One other thing. I'd like to show examples of people who are proviolence due to religion and people who are proviolence not due to religion.

Proviolence due to religion: Osama bin Laden, Becky Fischer (female camp manager in Jesus Camp)
Proviolence not due to religion: Saddam Hussein, Bill Kristol

Becky Fischer is proviolence due to her desire to turn Christian children into soldiers. She actually admires the violence and fervor that Palestinians teach their children.

Old Testament isn't what Christianity is about. Its basis is the New Testament.

The person of the Prophet is another huge difference. Jesus and Muhammad couldn't possibly be more different. If we look at the two religions through the deeds of their founders, we can easily say that Christianity is inherently peaceful, while Islam is inherently violent.

 

[Bill3000]

Old Testament isn't what Christianity is about. Its basis is the New Testament.

If that were truly the case, the Old Testament wouldn't be included to begin with, nor used to justify various stuff by Christians. But it is, and in almost all cases, in a pick-and-choose matter.

If we look at the two religions through the deeds of their founders, we can easily say that Christianity is inherently peaceful, while Islam is inherently violent.

Few Christians actually fully follow the ideas of the Sermon on the Mount/etc, so calling Christianity "inherently peaceful" is irrelevant. If they did, all Christians would be pacifists. Hell, in some versions the bible had simply been modified in the past to make the Sermon seem tamer, such as changing "Love your enemies" to "Pray for your enemies".

 

[C~G]

If we look at the two religions through the deeds of their founders, we can easily say that Christianity is inherently peaceful, while Islam is inherently violent.

The latter doesn't surprise coming from you but the former does.

But I guess you have already made your mind about it.

I see myself no problem of seeing how both religion can be interpreted in any which way you like either promote peace or violence.

 

[Winner]

If that were truly the case, the Old Testament wouldn't be included to begin with, nor used to justify various stuff by Christians. But it is, and in almost all cases, in a pick-and-choose matter.

It was included because people needed to know the first part.

 

[Mirc]

If that were truly the case, the Old Testament wouldn't be included to begin with, nor used to justify various stuff by Christians. But it is, and in almost all cases, in a pick-and-choose matter.

I disagree. The Old Testament is included so as we will always know from where we started, the ante-Christ* beginnings, first part of the religion, and we never lose respect for the monotheistic religions that existed before ours.

Few Christians actually fully follow the ideas of the Sermon on the Mount/etc, so calling Christianity "inherently peaceful" is irrelevant.

Well, blame the people for not applying Christianity correctly, not Christianity with its message, which is peaceful. As I said, I believe Christians who support violence are hypocrites.


*not anti-Christ, big difference

 

[Winner]

The latter doesn't surprise coming from you but the former does.

But I guess you have already made your mind about it.

I see myself no problem of seeing how both religion can be interpreted in any which way you like either promote peace or violence.

It's like Liberalism and Communism. Liberalism is inherently pro-freedom and Communism is inherently anti-freedom. Still, some people say that Communism is also pro-freedom and assert these two ideologies are equal when it comes to personal freedom. But they're not.

Religions aren't different. Objectivelly speaking, Islam promotes violence much more, throughout entire Koran. Christianity speaks about violence only in the parts of Bible which deal with the pre-Christian era, while the overall emphasis is placed on peace and love. Islamic message is summed up well in its name - it is submission.

 

[Che Guava]

Religions aren't different. Objectivelly speaking, Islam promotes violence much more, throughout entire Koran. Christianity speaks about violence only in the parts of Bible which deal with the pre-Christian era, while the overall emphasis is placed on peace and love. Islamic message is summed up well in its name - it is submission.

Just wanted to point out that 'submission' in islam is usually interpreted as personal submission to the ways of Allah, not submission to a sword.

 

[C~G]

It's like Liberalism and Communism. Liberalism is inherently pro-freedom and Communism is inherently anti-freedom. Still, some people say that Communism is also pro-freedom and assert these two ideologies are equal when it comes to personal freedom. But they're not.

Really?

This is probably based into either how communism has been practiced or political ideology that condemns everything to do with communism evil rather than the ideal behind communism.

You are blind to everything but what you want to see.

BTW, I have never said the current interpretarion of Islam that is in use wide spread of countries isn't inherently violent, I'm just saying that Islam like any other religion can be almost anything people eventually want it to be.

I find it rather strange how people especially like you Winner seem to miss the fact what kind of transformation christianity has made (or was forced to do) from being oppressive patriarchal state religion being something completely else. It's the primary illusion of islamophobics that outside there resides some kind of objective monolithic unchanging Islam that ever cannot be interpreted anything but as being inherently violent. I call that bluff and say it's BS.

Then again we have talked about this probably before, so nothing new under the sun.

 

[Bill3000]

Well, blame the people for not applying Christianity correctly, not Christianity with its message, which is peaceful. As I said, I believe Christians who support violence are hypocrites.

If a religion's message is such to the extent that the vast majority of adherents do not adhere to its message, because they feel that it is impossible to live up to it, then the religion defeats its purpose - no matter how noble those ideals may be.

View Post
It's like Liberalism and Communism. Liberalism is inherently pro-freedom and Communism is inherently anti-freedom. Still, some people say that Communism is also pro-freedom and assert these two ideologies are equal when it comes to personal freedom. But they're not.

Of course they arn't. They are complete opposites on the spectrum, and communism focuses on equality at the expensive of personal freedom. It is possible to be social libertarian and economically authortarian, however - that be the anarchist/syndicalist/social democrat quadrant.

 

[Winner]

Really?

This is probably based into either how communism has been practiced or political ideology that condemns everything to do with communism evil rather than the ideal behind communism.

You are blind to everything but what you want to see.

No, I am talking about foundations. Communism is anti-freedom not because it's "believers" were usually violent totalitarian bastards, but because the ideology itself is hostile to the concept of personal freedom.

Crimes have been committed in the name of liberalism, so is liberalism inherently wrong? No, it isn't. It's essence does not permit violence. On the other hand, essence of Communism is violent.

Christianity is a pacifist religion. Yes, people often did terrible things in its name, but not because the religion compelled them. On the other hand, terrible things done in the name of Islam are perfectly OK, because they can be justified by the essence of the religion, which sanctions violence against other people (infidels, pagans etc.).

BTW, I have never said the current interpretarion of Islam that is in use wide spread of countries isn't inherently violent, I'm just saying that Islam like any other religion can be almost anything people eventually want it to be.

It can't, Koran and other texts speak clearly. Why is it so hard for you to accept, that when Koran says "slay the unbelievers!", it really means "slay the unbelievers"? What else could it possibly mean? Certainly not something like "love your enemies".

I find it rather strange how people especially like you Winner seem to miss the fact what kind of transformation christianity has made (or was forced to do) from being oppressive patriarchal state religion being something completely else. It's the primary illusion of islamophobics that outside there resides some kind of objective monolithic unchanging Islam that ever cannot be interpreted anything but as being inherently violent. I call that bluff and say it's BS.

You can call it whatever you want, but you're wrong. Islam itself proves you wrong.

Then again we have talked about this probably before, so nothing new under the sun.

Yeah, and I learned that any discussion with you about this topic is pointless

 

[Shadylookin]

but something can't be violent if it's committed against the non-believers because they don't count

as sad and ironic as it is I've seen plenty of people that think Islam is violent advocate dropping nuclear warheads on people in meca. I think they're all violent and should be put in time-out until they can get along

 

[Phlegmak]

It can't, Koran and other texts speak clearly. Why is it so hard for you to accept, that when Koran says "slay the unbelievers!", it really means "slay the unbelievers"? What else could it possibly mean? Certainly not something like "love your enemies".

The obvious good about all this is that most Muslims don't follow the violent teachings in the book correctly.