Is Islam a peaceful or violent religion?

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Is Islam an inherently peaceful or violent religion (I’m not talking about all individual Muslims, I’m talking about Islam itself), and does it threaten Judeo-Christian/western civilization? Are the violent verses in the Qur’an and the Hadith truly violent, or just taken out of their historical context? What is your view on Islam as a whole?
 
If we judge Islam by it’s militarist history, beginning with Muhammad and the subsequent Islamic expansion after his deaths by the Caliphs, then calling it violent seems reasonable.
 
Jesus_Is_God said:
Is Islam an inherently peaceful or violent religion (I’m not talking about all individual Muslims, I’m talking about Islam itself), and does it threaten Judeo-Christian/western civilization? Are the violent verses in the Qur’an and the Hadith truly violent, or just taken out of their historical context? What is your view on Islam as a whole?
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It’s a false religion with violent members and peaceful members.
 
Jesus_Is_God said:
Is Islam an inherently peaceful or violent religion (I’m not talking about all individual Muslims, I’m talking about Islam itself), and does it threaten Judeo-Christian/western civilization? Are the violent verses in the Qur’an and the Hadith truly violent, or just taken out of their historical context? What is your view on Islam as a whole?
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Where violence is inclusive in its teachings and where Muslims do take up those teachings into action, I think it gravitates more towards the latter.
 
Tomdstone said:
According to Philip Jenkins, the Islamic scriptures in the Quran are much less violent than those in the Bible.
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124494788
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The bible might be a great more violent than the quran, yet the question is whether or not Islam itself is violent. Orthodox Islam of either the Shia or Sunni sides views not only the Quran as authoritative but also the traditions of the life of the Prophet and his teachings. Muhammad was not like Jesus who did not use force and instead submitted to the governing the authorities, he asserted governmental control for himself and Muhammad’s government was determined by his revelations. In light of the fact that any system of government can only impose it’s will by the threat of violence and Islam has tied to it the notion that there must be or ought to be an Islamic state, it seems obvious to conclude that violence forms part of Islam’s identity.
 
I think the Islamic teaching that asks the husband to beat the wife does result in violence, albeit domestic violent. It may sound innocuous if it is interpreted not as beating but a light beating only, it nevertheless sets a justification that a husband is to beat his wife when necessary. The implication of such teaching has enormous implication in the consequence for domestic violence because even without it, wife beating is still rampant. What more then when it is stated / allowed in religious teaching.
 
Jesus_Is_God said:
Is Islam an inherently peaceful or violent religion (I’m not talking about all individual Muslims, I’m talking about Islam itself), and does it threaten Judeo-Christian/western civilization? Are the violent verses in the Qur’an and the Hadith truly violent, or just taken out of their historical context? What is your view on Islam as a whole?
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What is a “religion” in the first place? In what way can a “religion” be “inherently” anything?
Or, in other words, do “religions” have essences?
As I see it, the only way a religion can have an essence is for a religion to be true. Insofar as a religion is not true, it’s just a bunch of ideas and practices. It can’t be “inherently” anything. Furthermore, religions are very large, complex things with multiple possibilities for interpretation.

Yes, of course there are “violent” passages in the Qur’an and hadith, as there are in the Bible. We should also question the term “violence.” Do you mean “any use of force” or is there a hidden assumption that we are talking about unjust or unprovoked force?

Rather than asking about the original historical context–which is important but not the most important factor in any traditional religious reading of a sacred text–we should be asking about how Muslims have traditionally understood these passages and what resources are available for Muslims today who depart from the traditional readings either in more or less violent ways.

The traditional Sunni position is that the caliph is obliged in principle to wage war on non-Muslim governments with the intention of subjugating the whole world to Islam (not of converting everyone to Islam, but of making them acknowledge Islamic supremacy). Temporary truces are possible, but a permanent state of peace between Muslim and non-Muslim governments is not envisioned in the traditional Sunni lawcodes, as far as I know.

“Ordinary” Muslims are generally obligated to fight only if Islam is being attacked.

ISIS claims to have restored the caliphate, but very few Muslims accept their claim.

Furthermore, many, perhaps most Muslims today believe that these codes applied to a world in which one could expect non-Muslim governments to be hostile toward and intolerant of Islam, even if they weren’t actively engaged in attacking Muslims at a given moment.

Most Muslims, in other words, interpret the concept of “armed jihad” or “external jihad” (there’s also the “internal jihad” against evil within oneself) in a defensive sense, very similarly to the Christian concept of “just war.” And also, like just war, jihad has certain rules it’s supposed to follow. Mainstream Islamic scholars have condemned 9/11 and similar attacks as violating Islamic laws of war.

Edwin
 
Tomdstone said:
According to Philip Jenkins, the Islamic scriptures in the Quran are much less violent than those in the Bible.
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124494788
Click to expand...
I’m not really sure that this comparison is meaningful. One can certainly say that more extreme violence is present in the Bible than in the Qur’an, in the sense that there is no command in the Qur’an, or in any classic Islamic source, to wipe out whole populations including women and children. That is, in fact, expressly condemned.

However, Christians can argue that these passages are relativized in the whole context of Scripture in a way that the “violent” passages in the Qur’an aren’t.

Edwin
 
First off I would not trust any of the media outlets, especially the one named above. Secondly and therefore you must figure it out for yourself. I have read parts of the koran, no I have never read the whole thing, but the parts that I did read seemed to directly contradict eachother, in one place calling for peace but later in the exact same situation calling for extreme violence.

I would say that, history being the judge, Islam is a religion in which individuals and groups of individuals use to further their interests and more often than not that is accomplished with violence.

All in all if you were to compare Judaism and subsequently Christianity to that of Islam it would be Islam that is more violent.
 
Whenever I point one finger at the “other” I’m at the same time pointing three back towards me.
When I am agitated or angry at another and slow down enough to “look in the mirror” I more often than not see that I have and exhibit those same traits that bother me the most in that person or group. As much as possible I try to remember Matthew 7:5.
 
USMC_Convert said:
First off I would not trust any of the media outlets, especially the one named above. Secondly and therefore you must figure it out for yourself. I have read parts of the koran, no I have never read the whole thing, but the parts that I did read seemed to directly contradict eachother, in one place calling for peace but later in the exact same situation calling for extreme violence.

I would say that, history being the judge, Islam is a religion in which individuals and groups of individuals use to further their interests and more often than not that is accomplished with violence.

All in all if you were to compare Judaism and subsequently Christianity to that of Islam it would be Islam that is more violent.
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I’m not sure that historically we can say that Islam is more violent than Christianity. It would depend on our measure and what we “counted.”

Judaism is the least violent of the three major monotheistic religions, but then Jews have not had political power for most of their history. They’ve been quite violent on the occasions when they had the opportunity.

At the risk of being trite: people are violent. It’s a major aspect of human sinfulness. Given the power, most groups will use that power in violent ways. And if they believe in divine revelation, they will appeal to that revelation to support their violence.
 
Tomdstone said:
According to Philip Jenkins, the Islamic scriptures in the Quran are much less violent than those in the Bible.
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124494788
Click to expand...
The bible certainly documents many instances of violence. The historical elements of the bible would not be historical if it did not include man’s tendency to violence. 🤷

I suspect you would be suspect of the bible if it did not include tales of war.
Before you object with “but God commanded violence” please take note that Catholics do not read the bible like fundamentalists. We read the whole bible *in context, with Christ as the key to interpretation. * In light of Christ, God does not command murder.

The are violent Muslims and peaceful Muslims, but it’s hare to avoid the legacy left behind by the prophet himself in this area.
*Jesus is an entirely different person than Mohammed. *
 
Contarini said:
I’m not sure that historically we can say that Islam is more violent than Christianity. It would depend on our measure and what we “counted.”

Judaism is the least violent of the three major monotheistic religions, but then Jews have not had political power for most of their history. They’ve been quite violent on the occasions when they had the opportunity.

At the risk of being trite: people are violent. It’s a major aspect of human sinfulness. Given the power, most groups will use that power in violent ways. And if they believe in divine revelation, they will appeal to that revelation to support their violence.
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You know after about 15 years in the Marine Corps I learned that the single hardest thing to teach Marines is how to say “I don’t know”. Perhaps you are correct, I honestly don’t know.

However I will say this, I think it is more important to look at which religion teaches what. That being said, I believe that the obvious choice is Christianity for being the lesser of the violent religions. What people have done with the religions and what people do in the name of religion is less important that what each religion teaches.

Therefore I say, I don’t know, but I would suspect that Islam is more violent.
 
TheAmazingGrace said:
It’s a false religion with violent members and peaceful members.
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This is simultaneously the simplest and most complete answer. 👍

All false religions remove the divinity of Christ and in some way deny the once-and-for-all-times sacrifice He made. In doing so, they implicitly do violence against the True God, and often manifest this in explicit violence against His people.
 
Peter_Plato said:
Exhibit B

youtu.be/I_To-cV94Bo
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That’s interesting information but does not adequately address the accusations of Judeo/Christian violence.
For me, the proper answer to accusations of violence is “meal culpa”. Yes these things happen on all sides.

The difference between Islam the religion and Christianity the religion is simply
Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ is nothing like Muhammed.
 
Exhibit C

According to the Encyclopedia of Wars, by Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod, published in 2005, of the 1763 wars recorded in human historical accounts, 123 can be attributed to religious motives. That amounts to 6.98% of all documented wars.

Of those 123 “religious” wars, 66 were instigated by Islamic nations or religious entities. That is, more than half (53.7%) of all religiously motivated wars, started by any religion in the world were started and waged by Islamic nations/groups on other peoples. This shows that Islam has a proportionally greater tendency to wage war than all other religions combined.
 
goout said:
That’s interesting information but does not adequately address the accusations of Judeo/Christian violence.
For me, the proper answer to accusations of violence is “meal culpa”. Yes these things happen on all sides.

The difference between Islam the religion and Christianity the religion is simply
Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ is nothing like Muhammed.
Click to expand...
How does it not address the accusations? It makes a prima facie case, for example, that the crusades were in response to approximately 400 years of Islamic aggression into Christian lands.

Whether they happen “on all sides” is not the proper question. It is more appropriate to ask whether they happen with equal frequency and intensity on all sides.
 
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