What Muslims are taught in their mosques - unbiased

[Montalban]

If you were to say that all Nazis personally killed Jews (or perhaps even that all members of the Nazi party knew about the Final Solution), you would be violating truth and charity, and I would rebuke you for it. That’s my point.

That’s not a point I made. However did they support such an ideology? They’d have to have done so to have been, by the very difinition of being a Nazi

Your disapproval of Islam does not justify you in saying things that are not true–on the contrary, you should be far more scrupulously accurate about Islam than about something you like.

Edwin

Where have I said things that are untrue? Innuendo from you -the best response, perhaps?

 

[Rodrigo_Bivar]

I agree with Montalban.

All Nazis are collectively responsible for supporting Nazi ideology. By definition this must be so. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be Nazis. Some Nazis killed Jews and committed other Nazi atrocities. However, all Nazis are responsible for making this possible and for supporting their fellow Nazis who commit these atrocities. Not every Nazi killed Jews but they all share some degree of responsibility. You cannot absolve any Nazi from the anti-semitism that is Nazi ideology.

It’s the same with Muslims and the Islamic ideology of jihad. If Muslims repudiate the concept of jihad then they would no longer be responsible for the Islamic ideology of jihad. However, this is not so. Muslims bear collective responsibility for supporting and propagating the Islamic doctrine of jihad. You cannot absolve any Muslim from the jihadist ideology that is Islamic doctrine.

Nobody is saying all Muslims are jihadists but they are all certainly Jihadi-supporters and propagators.

 

[Montalban]

I agree with Montalban.

All Nazis are collectively responsible for supporting Nazi ideology. By definition this must be so. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be Nazis. Some Nazis killed Jews and committed other Nazi atrocities. However, all Nazis are responsible for making this possible and for supporting their fellow Nazis who commit these atrocities. Not every Nazi killed Jews but they all share some degree of responsibility. You cannot absolve any Nazi from the anti-semitism that is Nazi ideology.

It’s the same with Muslims and the Islamic ideology of jihad. If Muslims repudiate the concept of jihad then they would no longer be responsible for the Islamic ideology of jihad. However, this is not so. Muslims bear collective responsibility for supporting and propagating the Islamic doctrine of jihad. You cannot absolve any Muslim from the jihadist ideology that is Islamic doctrine.

Nobody is saying all Muslims are jihadists but they are all certainly Jihadi-supporters and propagators.

Thanks for the words of support. In WWII, even a humble German telegraph delivery boy would be supporting the instrument of terror by going about delivering messages that helped that machine run.

The idea of collective guilt *is *in fact something Moslems support. They bomb Israeli passenger jest because they are ‘Israeli’

This goes back to the time of Muahmmed when they killed all the men of the Banu Quaresh (who hadn’t already converted) because some broke a treaty.

However as Christans we don’t treat all Moslems as terrorists. That’s because we’re better than that. However we do recognise an evil idea when it confronts us, and in this case that’s Islam

Thus we judge here the ideology. The ideology promotes evil. We call it as it is.

I recall once a programme called Geoffrey Robertson’s Hypotheticals - Geoffrey Robertson was an Australian-born barrister who practiced law in London. For his tv shows he’d have a panel of experts and he’d pose them hypotheticals. Shortyl after Salmaan Rushdie had been condemned to death Robertson had a panel of Moslems. On this panel was Yusuf Islam (nee Cat Stevens). Robertson asked Cat if he had seen Rushdie, would he kill him. Cat said no, but he’d phone people who he knew would. Would he still not be guilty of murder? He attemtped to show how he was still ‘western’ but he was simply showing that he would still do such evils - albeit through someone else.

 

[Icarus210]

Wow, what a thread.

Evey catholic should love muslims (individuals). Every catholic should repel Islam (the faith).

It’s our God given dignity of all things good to try to destroy all non-catholic belief structures. Through prayer and love for each individual trapped into that false belief system. And that means showing them the untruths in their dogmas. We cant be a practising catholic if we let heathens even think for a moment that we respect their religion, which is completely different from showing any disrespect to the person. Love means giving truth always, not lying to make someone feel nice and loved.

Aussies (and kiwis) arn’t racist or sepratist by any stretch of the imagination. But we dont seem to handle “political correct” wishywashy statements either. and just dont even think about calling aussies bigots here either, there are too many of us here to back each other up to let that go unanswered.

Islam is a terrible religion, built on the sword, and carried on by the sword… or in modern times, Murderer/suicidists… NOT MARTYRDOM… I noticed one post about christian circumcision. As far as I know that has happened only on the males, NEVER on the females, which is an act of absolute barbarism. For any religion to condone that shows how pagan and inhuman that religion is. And lets get truthfull… Islam means Submission… not and never has been “peace”

God Bless.

 

[Montalban]

Wow, what a thread.

Evey catholic should love muslims (individuals). Every catholic should repel Islam (the faith).

Love the sinner, hate the sin. Islam’s hate the sinner, kill him!

It’s our God given dignity of all things good to try to destroy all non-catholic belief structures. Through prayer and love for each individual trapped into that false belief system. And that means showing them the untruths in their dogmas. We cant be a practising catholic if we let heathens even think for a moment that we respect their religion, which is completely different from showing any disrespect to the person. Love means giving truth always, not lying to make someone feel nice and loved.

Aussies (and kiwis) arn’t racist or sepratist by any stretch of the imagination. But we dont seem to handle “political correct” wishywashy statements either. and just dont even think about calling aussies bigots here either, there are too many of us here to back each other up to let that go unanswered.

Islam is a terrible religion, built on the sword, and carried on by the sword… or in modern times, Murderer/suicidists… NOT MARTYRDOM… I noticed one post about christian circumcision. As far as I know that has happened only on the males, NEVER on the females, which is an act of absolute barbarism. For any religion to condone that shows how pagan and inhuman that religion is. And lets get truthfull… Islam means Submission… not and never has been “peace”

God Bless.

Islam was invented by essentially a caravan-raider.

 

[dolphinlove]

You made a generalization about people in general who “stick up for” Muslims, presumably including me. My point is that any human being deserves to be “stuck up for” at some point. For instance, if someone were to say that Hitler killed his own mother, I would point out that there’s no evidence that he did any such thing. That’s “sticking up for” Hitler in the sense that I’d be pointing out that an accusation against him was false. It wouldn’t mean that I thought Hitler was a nice person.

By and large, I don’t like Islam much (with the exception of Sufism). I think it is indeed more intrinsically prone to violence than Christianity, though Christianity has plenty of problems in that regard. I find its “absolute monotheism” completely unconvincing and unappealing. I find its emphasis on divine power rather than love (again, by and large and with Sufism as a glorious exception) deeply repellent. And so on, and so forth. But when people make statements I believe to be inaccurate or unsupported, I will point this out. I’m a scholar of religion by profession (though primarily of the history of Christianity), so it’s my job to be as fair and accurate as possible. But it’s also my responsibility as a human being and a Christian.

In Christ,

Edwin

How am I making a generalization when i was just talking about one person? Your jumping to conclusions.

 

[Montalban]

By and large, I don’t like Islam much (with the exception of Sufism). I think it is indeed more intrinsically prone to violence than Christianity, though Christianity has plenty of problems in that regard. I find its “absolute monotheism” completely unconvincing and unappealing. I find its emphasis on divine power rather than love (again, by and large and with Sufism as a glorious exception) deeply repellent. And so on, and so forth. But when people make statements I believe to be inaccurate or unsupported, I will point this out. I’m a scholar of religion by profession (though primarily of the history of Christianity), so it’s my job to be as fair and accurate as possible. But it’s also my responsibility as a human being and a Christian.

In Christ,

Edwin

Yet all you’ve done here is deal with generalisations; such as your ‘problems’ with Christianity on the issue of violence.

 

[dessert]

i could go to an anti-christian site too and drag up something ugly from the bible.

THERE IS NOTHING UGLY FROM THE BIBLE
DESSERT

 

[Contarini]

How am I making a generalization when i was just talking about one person? Your jumping to conclusions.

I misinterpreted your post–sorry. You started with the third person, talking about fatma, and then in the next paragraph switched to the second person: “you.” I assumed that you were still talking about rather than to fatma, and therefore that “you” referred to anyone who was “sticking up for” Islam.

Edwin

 

[dessert]

some people just amaze me. Why must you quote from an anti-muslim site to prove what muslims believe booklover? Whats wrong with quoting from a muslim site. I could have easily went to an anti-catholic site to learn about catholics but I’m here on a catholic site instead because I want to get my information from a non-biased source.

Here is a video sermon delivered in holy month of Muharram this year, hope you enjoy it.

PROOF

Yes I did listen but about half is in Arabic or whatever so skipped a lot as he speaks his own language that more fluently obviously. He sounds like Jimmy Swaggart including the crying at the end.

I did not enjoy it. How did it impress you?
Dessert

 

[Mirdath]

THERE IS NOTHING UGLY FROM THE BIBLE
DESSERT

You’re completely wrong. Incest, genocide, political assassination, polygamy, senseless slaughter, draconian punishments, and all manner of horror is not only in the Bible, it’s commanded, permitted, or in some cases even performed by your God who later got an engaged woman with child. And that doesn’t even go into the ‘ugly’ things present in the Bible that God could be bothered to take issue with: child sacrifice (although, in a certain perspective, what else was the crucifixion of Jesus than this?), adultery, rape, theft, blasphemy.

One who says the Bible is made of smiles, candy, puppies, sunshine, rainbows and unicorns hasn’t read it.

 

[thedavidwilson]

Unfortunately, many Christians do use the scriptures to back themselves up in this respect. Some are anti-Semites because they still hold the Jews responsible for the crucifixion of Jesus. Some are racists because they believe black people are descended from Noah’s cursed son Ham. Some bomb abortion clinics or shoot doctors because they think God requires it. Some Protestants are anti-Catholic because they think you guys worship Mary. There are Christian terrorist groups like the Army of God and Christian Identity who base their hatred in scripture.

I’m glad the Church does not support such people; but they still exist and they still abuse scripture for their own ends. Islam has its problems, but so does Christianity; and I would hope the members of each faith will think to look to their own issues before presuming to tell others how to handle them.

The difference between Christianity and islam in this matter is that islamic texts DO encourage violence, islamic teachers do encourage violence. That tiny minority of Christians who are vilent are not supported by scripture, whereas muslims are supported by islamic texts to commit violence against unbelivers.

 

[thedavidwilson]

You’re completely wrong. Incest, genocide, political assassination, polygamy, senseless slaughter, draconian punishments, and all manner of horror is not only in the Bible, it’s commanded, permitted, or in some cases even performed by your God who later got an engaged woman with child. And that doesn’t even go into the ‘ugly’ things present in the Bible that God could be bothered to take issue with: child sacrifice (although, in a certain perspective, what else was the crucifixion of Jesus than this?), adultery, rape, theft, blasphemy.

One who says the Bible is made of smiles, candy, puppies, sunshine, rainbows and unicorns hasn’t read it.

Please provide quotes to support your accusations. Otherwise people will think you are a fool and I for one do not want that.

 

[Contarini]

The difference between Christianity and islam in this matter is that islamic texts DO encourage violence, islamic teachers do encourage violence. That tiny minority of Christians who are vilent are not supported by scripture, whereas muslims are supported by islamic texts to commit violence against unbelivers.

But that’s just not true. The people who shoot abortion-providing doctors claim to be supported by Scripture. Christian governments who executed heretics, and the church courts that handed people over for such punishment, claimed to be following Scripture. You may interpret Scripture differently, but it is easy to see how Scripture could be seen as supporting violence.

I do think there are differences, but it’s not as simple as “the Bible doesn’t support violence and the Qur’an does.”

Edwin

 

[thedavidwilson]

i put that there because that is exactly what the people on this forum are doing to islam. i am a catholic BTW, not a muslim but i believe in showing muslims respect and not vilifying them. everyone on here is quoting out-of-context from the koran to vilify islam so shame on them. I cannot bring u out ofyour ignorance about islam. I tell u i know hundreds of muslims and understand the vilification in the media however u r convinced that u know what you are talking about.
salam and god forgive u for being so unfair.

Please explain the context of this quote from the “noble” koran:

[9.29] Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Apostle have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection.

Sounds like they want to make war on me a poor catholic “unbeliver” until I submit to islam, but please pull me out of the depth of my ignorance.

 

[Rodrigo_Bivar]

The people who shoot abortion-providing doctors claim to be supported by Scripture.

Dear Edwin,
Now would be a good time to produce these verse(s) and let’s see how explicit they are.

In contrast, we have explicit verses in the Quran that tell Muslims to jihad the infidels.

Thank you and much obliged,

Rodrigo

 

[Mirdath]

Please provide quotes to support your accusations. Otherwise people will think you are a fool and I for one do not want that.

Certainly.

Incest: the beginning of Genesis, there being only Adam, Eve, and their children to procreate; later, Noah’s children and wife in the same boat (pardon the pun); Lot and his daughters (Genesis 19:31-36).

Genocide: the entire book of Joshua, in which the Israelite armies parade throughout the land of Canaan, slaughtering entire city-states. Later, in 1 Samuel 15, Saul is rebuked for not committing genocide against the Amalekites. Nor are these the only examples: the Israelites put entire tribes, cities, and populations to the sword, until only they and the few who managed to surrender in time were left. They killed man, woman, and child indiscriminately – down to the livestock, leaving nothing alive in their wake. And God commanded this, exhorting them to do his will in Joshua 1; he looked upon the carnage, and found it good.

Assassination: Judith 13:1-8. One of the great heroines of the Israelites plies an enemy general with wine and promises of sex until he passes out, and promptly slices his head off. At her return, she shouted Praise God, praise him! Praise God, who has not withdrawn his mercy from the house of Israel, but has shattered our enemies by my hand this very night.

Polygamy: Jacob married Rachel and Leah, two sisters (Genesis 29). David had multiple wives; Solomon is said to have had a thousand.

Senseless slaughter: well, aside from the ‘genocide’ section. God slew Uzzah for reaching out to steady the Ark of the Covenant (2 Samuel 6:6-7). Elisha called upon God to send bears to kill a gang of children that taunted him (2 Kings 2: 24-25), death toll totaling 42 for shouting ‘go up, thou baldhead!’. And many more!

Draconian punishments: whole swaths of Leviticus and Deuteronomy prescribe stoning or other capital punishment as the cure for a whole lot of ails: premarital sex, witchcraft, adultery, blasphemy. Deuteronomy 25: 11-12 states that a woman who attempts to break up a fight between her husband and another man and inadvertently touches the other man’s genitals shall have her hand cut off. Deuteronomy 25 also allows up to 40 lashes of a whip as punishment for the guilty party in civil suits.

There’s more too!

Slavery: Leviticus 25: 44-46; Exodus 21: 2-6. Exodus 21:7-11 lays down the law about how to sell your daughter into prostitution, and no, she doesn’t get to go free or into indenture after six years like a male Israelite slave would.

Rape: the Israelites prefigured the ravishing of the Sabine women by Romans in Judges 21: 10-12, except they were picky and only ‘spared’ virgin girls; everybody else was slain. In Numbers 31: 14-18, God gets ticked off that the Israelites spared the Midianite women; through Moses, he orders that all of them who had not been deflowered at that point were to be killed, only the virgins left alive. Deuteronomy 22: 28-29 specifies that a woman who is raped must marry the rapist, after he pays the dowry; and he cannot divorce her. Again, there are other examples.

 

[Montalban]

Certainly.

Incest: the beginning of Genesis, there being only Adam, Eve, and their children to procreate; later, Noah’s children and wife in the same boat (pardon the pun); Lot and his daughters (Genesis 19:31-36).

Where, for instance, does it say to do as Lot did?

 

[Montalban]

But that’s just not true. The people who shoot abortion-providing doctors claim to be supported by Scripture.

So what? If I was put on trial for murder and I said you urged me to do it, and you hadn’t you’d say you were guilty too?
Course not!

Show me a causal link between their actions and the teachings of Jesus.

Christian governments who executed heretics, and the church courts that handed people over for such punishment, claimed to be following Scripture. You may interpret Scripture differently, but it is easy to see how Scripture could be seen as supporting violence.

So when Jesus says “Love one another” and people kill, and when Muhammed says “Slay the non-believers” and people kill, they’re kinda similar?

I do think there are differences, but it’s not as simple as “the Bible doesn’t support violence and the Qur’an does.”

Edwin

There are differences. Find me teachings of Jesus, and a history of Church Fathers promoting/interpreting that as pro-violence.

 

[Contarini]

So what? If I was put on trial for murder and I said you urged me to do it, and you hadn’t you’d say you were guilty too?
Course not!

Show me a causal link between their actions and the teachings of Jesus.

There is a lot more in the Bible than the teachings of Jesus. That is the basic fallacy in what you are saying. To make the Bible teach total non-violence, you have to adopt a hermeneutic in which the Sermon on the Mount is key to everything else. If you give the OT equal importance with the NT, you wind up justifying all sorts of religious violence. If you privilege Paul, you get something else again.

The same is true of the Qur’an. The view that has dominated Islam historically, and that on the whole you and other anti-Islamic Christians refer to as the true Islamic position (though you ignore the places where Bin Laden and other radical Muslims today depart from this historic consensus), holds as I understand it that the Medina suras trump the Meccan ones. Moderate Muslims do the opposite. Again, it’s a question of hermeneutics. There is a spectrum of interpretation in both Islam and Christianity, but since the Bible is far more diverse than the Qur’an the spectrum is much wider in Christianity, and the Bible is certainly much easier to interpret in a non-violent way than the Qur’an (and by and large, harder to interpret, taken as a whole, as sanctioning ruthless violence, though there are certainly passages that could be and have been used that way).

Edwin