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rookieonedge said:
Below is a link to a site that compares the teachings of Jesus and Mohammed. It may be of some interest to you.

lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/mar/080305a.html
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this link holds selective quoting with extreme bias. A similar page could be made, but biased in the other direction instead. Here are some quotes to start you off:

Jesus makes war. (rev 19.11)
Jesus will kill her children with death (rev 2.23)
Everyone on earth will wail because of Jesus (rev 1.7)
When Jesus returns, he’ll burn up the whole earth and everything on it (2pet3.10)
Two wrongs make a right. (james2.13)
Jesus will take vengeance on them that know not God by burning them forever "n flaming fire. (2thess1.7)
Jesus says that God is like a slave-owner who beats his slaves “with many stripes.” (luke12.46)
Jesus says that entire cities will be violently destroyed and the inhabitants “thrust down to hell” for not receiving his disciples (luke 10.10)
Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children as required by Old Testament law. (mark 7.9)
Jesus tells us to cut off our hands and feet, and pluck out our eyes to avoid going to hell.(mark 9.43)
Jesus strongly approves of the law and the prophets. He hasn’t the slightest objection to the cruelties of the Old Testament.(matt 5.17)
Whoever is a friend of the world is an enemy of God.(james 4.4)
God will cause us to believe lies so that he can damn our souls to hell.(2thess2.11)
Those who “blaspheme against the Holy Ghost” will never be forgiven(luke 12.10)
Jesus calls the Pharisees “hypocrites, wicked, and adulterous.”(matt 15.2)
 
wasmit said:
this link holds selective quoting with extreme bias. A similar page could be made, but biased in the other direction instead. Here are some quotes to start you off:

Jesus makes war. (rev 19.11)
Jesus will kill her children with death (rev 2.23)
Everyone on earth will wail because of Jesus (rev 1.7)
When Jesus returns, he’ll burn up the whole earth and everything on it (2pet3.10)
Two wrongs make a right. (james2.13)
Jesus will take vengeance on them that know not God by burning them forever "n flaming fire. (2thess1.7)
Jesus says that God is like a slave-owner who beats his slaves “with many stripes.” (luke12.46)
Jesus says that entire cities will be violently destroyed and the inhabitants “thrust down to hell” for not receiving his disciples (luke 10.10)
Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children as required by Old Testament law. (mark 7.9)
Jesus tells us to cut off our hands and feet, and pluck out our eyes to avoid going to hell.(mark 9.43)
Jesus strongly approves of the law and the prophets. He hasn’t the slightest objection to the cruelties of the Old Testament.(matt 5.17)
Whoever is a friend of the world is an enemy of God.(james 4.4)
God will cause us to believe lies so that he can damn our souls to hell.(2thess2.11)
Those who “blaspheme against the Holy Ghost” will never be forgiven(luke 12.10)
Jesus calls the Pharisees “hypocrites, wicked, and adulterous.”(matt 15.2)
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I suppose I could look up each biblical reference and study the contextual analysis of each statement, but that is better left to the biblical scholars. Suffice to say, that it is outlandish to read a word, phrase, sentence or paragraph out of the context of the entirety. That is why Catholics enjoy the gift of the Magisterium to interpret difficult texts. However, the last one is true in and of itself. The one just above that about the sin against the Holy Ghost (Spirit) is in reference to the ONLY sin that can never be forgiven and that is the choice to remain apart from God at the last moment, the last breath, so to speak. Another example: “Whoever is a friend of the world is an enemy of God.” We all know the three temptations – “the world, the flesh, and the devil” – so, yes, in as much as one is worldly to the point of sinfulness. But the one below, that “God will cause us to believe lies so that he can damn our souls to hell,” do you believe that? It isn’t logical for starters. Why would He create us just to damn us? The choice is ours. As for cutting off our hands and plucking out our eyes to avoid serious sin, from the text it’s obvious that it was spoken figuratively. (Radical Islamists require that type of punishment apparently though. Or beheadings!) I could go on, but you know what I mean. These are falsehoods, patently untrue. By the way, have you read the bible? The koran? The Hadiths? Compare the words (real words in the bible) to the real words of Mohammed.

I realize your point is to say the same is true of the quotes from the teachings of Mohammed. I still say, read both bible and Koran in context and see what you come up with.
 
I have read the bible, and am in the process of reading the quran.

I have found that there are a great many similarities. Also, that both texts can be interpreted to mean almost whatever you want.
 
wasmit said:
more specifically, I understand that christians claim that the bible is the inerrant word of god, and the absolute truth, and that all other holy books are wrong.
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Maybe some “christians” make that claim, but the Church does not. The Church teaches that other religions have truth mixed with varying amounts of error, whereas the Church enjoys the fullness of the truth.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
wasmit said:
Almost everyone (like 98%) chose the “right” answer to the questions on morality. This suggests that almost every human has an innate sense of right and wrong, regardless of location/background/wealth.
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Yes, this is a very important observation. And after addressing a few assumptions about this observation, we can proceed with the argument. This law of “right and wrong” is pretty interesting, because everyone expects to be treated according to these “laws”, yet many times fail to obey the law themselves.

So my question for you is this:
  • Who “invented” this law?
  • If nobody in particular invented it, where did it come from?
-erbo

Edit:
I’m not asking you these questions to try to trick you into anything, or jump to conclusions. I just want to be absolutely sure we are talking about the same thing, so I’m asking you these questions in order to better define this “Law of Right and Wrong” that we’ll be discussing.
 
wasmit said:
Similarly, the koran says muhammad did many extraordinary things.
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Like what?

BTW, Keep your comment here in mind as we go down the page.
was:
I’m not really sure what point you’re trying to make here.
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What’s unclear?

Did anyone witness Muhammad raise anyone from the dead?
Did anyone witness Muhammad cure anyone for example of leprosy?
Did anyone witness Muhammad rise from the dead?
Did anyone witness him ascend to heaven?

What point are you not sure of?

Are you unsure of what eye witnesses means?
was:
is this the “the bible says it is true” argument?
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Don’t be hypocritical. Look at your response to me at the top of the page.

That’s why I asked you previously, and used the word witness, as in eye witness, to prove the events I asked you about.

Well, does the quran say any of that about Muhammad backed up by eyewitnesses?
 
mlchance said:
more specifically, I understand that christians claim that the bible is the inerrant word of god, and the absolute truth, and that all other holy books are wrong.
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Yes, that is what I am saying - the catholic church claims to have/know the absolute truth, while the other religions do not have the absolute truth.

Many other religions make the same claim - that they are true and the others are not.

My question is how is it that this claim is true, and not the others?
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wasmit said:
Many other religions make the same claim - that they are true and the others are not.

My question is how is it that this claim is true, and not the others?
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It seems that the question you are asking is so extraordinarily massive that anywhere one might start in answering it will not be satisfying in some way. I do not say this to discourage your question per se, but simply to point out in answering your question that we have to keep in mind any particular answer is not the whole story.

There is only one truth about any particular subject, but there are an indefinite number of falsehoods. For instance, the statement “Eric’s computer is sitting on his lap.” is true. However, the statement “Eric’s computer is in New Zealand.” or “Eric’s computer is on his desk.” or “Eric’s computer is broken.” are all false. One can continually find false statements but there is only one truth.

That being said it is daunting to say all the ways that everything other than the truth is wrong. Where should one begin? It might be more helpful to start from a specific and basic question, and work from there.
  • Eric
 
erbo said:
Almost everyone (like 98%) chose the “right” answer to the questions on morality. This suggests that almost every human has an innate sense of right and wrong, regardless of location/background/wealth.
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(1) I don’t know.
(2) I don’t know.

As a guess, I would use this analogy - Almost all humans have two arms. Who invented humans having two arms? No-one. Then where did humans having two arms come from? The theory of evolution is the best candidate. Morality might have the same origin.

That said, that was just a guess, and I don’t know the answers to your two questions.
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wasmit said:
Yes, that is what I am saying - the catholic church claims to have/know the absolute truth, while the other religions do not have the absolute truth.
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The Church claims to have the fullness of the truth. I’m not sure what “absolute truth” is supposed to be.
wasmit said:
My question is how is it that this claim is true, and not the others?
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Through study and honest examination of the evidence.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
wasmit said:
The theory of evolution is the best candidate. Morality might have the same origin.
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This is why I wanted to ask you those questions. I think that it’s reasonable to say that evolution has helped us develop “instincts” to survive. However, what I’m talking about isn’t about the instincts themselves, but transcends them.

To use another example from C.S. Lewis, if you see someone drowning nearby, there are probably two conflicting “instincts” that are working in your mind. The first instinct is that of self-preservation, which would motivate you to want to get away from the situation. On the other hand, another (maybe a tribal) instinct would motivate you to jump in and attempt to save the drowning person.

In this situation, C.S. Lewis made the observation that there is actually a third force at work: this force encourages you to favor one instinct over the other when they are in conflict. This third force would be what I’m describing as the “Law of Right and Wrong”. It is a law describing how we “should” behave, not how we actually behave.

If you can understand the observation I am making and agree that this described “force” (what I am calling the “Law of Right and Wrong”) exists, then we can proceed and look at the implications it. If not, feel free to ask questions about this “law” that I’m describing.

-erbo
 
Eric_Closs said:
It seems that the question you are asking is so extraordinarily massive that anywhere one might start in answering it will not be satisfying in some way. I do not say this to discourage your question per se, but simply to point out in answering your question that we have to keep in mind any particular answer is not the whole story.

There is only one truth about any particular subject, but there are an indefinite number of falsehoods. For instance, the statement “Eric’s computer is sitting on his lap.” is true. However, the statement “Eric’s computer is in New Zealand.” or “Eric’s computer is on his desk.” or “Eric’s computer is broken.” are all false. One can continually find false statements but there is only one truth.

That being said it is daunting to say all the ways that everything other than the truth is wrong. Where should one begin? It might be more helpful to start from a specific and basic question, and work from there.
  • Eric
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My original question was about the bibile and koran.
 
mlchance said:
Yes, that is what I am saying - the catholic church claims to have/know the absolute truth, while the other religions do not have the absolute truth.
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I was just using a different word to mean the same thing.
My question is how is it that this claim is true, and not the others?
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Through study and honest examination of the evidence.
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What evidence? I have not found any so far to suggest that one particular religion is true, while all the others are not.
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erbo said:
This is why I wanted to ask you those questions. I think that it’s reasonable to say that evolution has helped us develop “instincts” to survive. However, what I’m talking about isn’t about the instincts themselves, but transcends them.

To use another example from C.S. Lewis, if you see someone drowning nearby, there are probably two conflicting “instincts” that are working in your mind. The first instinct is that of self-preservation, which would motivate you to want to get away from the situation. On the other hand, another (maybe a tribal) instinct would motivate you to jump in and attempt to save the drowning person.

In this situation, C.S. Lewis made the observation that there is actually a third force at work: this force encourages you to favor one instinct over the other when they are in conflict. This third force would be what I’m describing as the “Law of Right and Wrong”. It is a law describing how we “should” behave, not how we actually behave.

If you can understand the observation I am making and agree that this described “force” (what I am calling the “Law of Right and Wrong”) exists, then we can proceed and look at the implications it. If not, feel free to ask questions about this “law” that I’m describing.

-erbo
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about the third force - this claim would need to be backed up before I can agree with it. For example, I pose an alternative - that the instincts that humans have can be strong or weak, and the stronger one wins, and therefore dictates action. In the drowning example, the rescuer’s survival instinct would be weak if the victim is in a bathtub (low risk), and strong if the victim is in a large, fast and dangerous river(high risk). Also, the protection(rescuing) instinct would be strong if the victim is a family member, and weak if the victim is black and the rescuer is a white racist.

Of course, at the moment, there is no reason to believe either the “third force” hypothesis or the “greater of two forces” hypothesis, because there is no evidence for either (that I know of).
 
wasmit said:
What evidence? I have not found any so far to suggest that one particular religion is true, while all the others are not.
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Just because you haven’t found it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Maybe you’ve not looked hard enough, or in the right places, or with sufficient honesty and humility, or some combination of the three.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
wasmit said:
For example, I pose an alternative - that the instincts that humans have can be strong or weak, and the stronger one wins, and therefore dictates action.
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That definitely makes sense. If one of the instincts is stronger than the other, then it obviously makes sense that one would act on that instinct. Maybe it’s the adrenaline at work, but it seems that when we are confronted with these dire situations, we are most aware of this “moral law”, which actually “urges” us to side on the weaker of the two conflicting instincts. Although you would probably be safer and better off walking away from the drowning person, the “moral law” urges you to save him regardless. It is that sense of duty (or awareness of the “moral law”) that urges us to side with the weaker impulse.
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wasmit:
Of course, at the moment, there is no reason to believe either the “third force” hypothesis or the “greater of two forces” hypothesis, because there is no evidence for either (that I know of).
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Humans can study the world around them and how things behave. On the basis of human observations, one can devise theories and laws that perfectly describe how a body will behave when acted on by an outside force. In a way, this “moral law” that I’m describing is similar to scientific laws but with one key difference.

Because we are human, we can observe our own behavior from a unique perspective that we can’t observe any other object in the universe from. We observe that there is this “moral law”, yet we can freely choose to disobey it. Unlike the “moral law”, a human can’t “disobey” the law of gravity (or any of the laws of physics for that matter).

Therefore, it seems that if this moral law exists, we can only describe it from our own behaviors and thoughts and instincts because this is a law that describes how we SHOULD behave, not how we ACTUALLY behave (which is what physics, chemistry, psychology, sociology, etc explain).

-erbo
 
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