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Religious scholars issue unanimous fatwa declaring suicide attacks Haram
- Thread starter Crabtownboy
- Start date
Would someone tell this guy what engaging in the discussion means.
Happy to oblige: you could start by stating whether or not the Bible contains statements encouraging or condoning genocide and other forms of violence rather than resorting to calling posts 'evil'.
Inciting violence? I would say no.
Ordering Israel to remove wickedness from the land by killing those living in the land who would kill them. Yes. Yes God ordered this by His Sovereign decree.
Did God order any killing beyond the borders of Israel? No. No He didn't.
Would you care to compare the orders of Muhammad as compared to Moses?
In what way is ordering the killing of those in the land not inciting violence?
By Jesus or his followers, none whatsoever.
So how much of the rest of the Bible are you prepared to excise to achieve that result?
The old testement is an accurate hustorical document about God's relationship to his chosen people and is useful for instruction and guidance.
But, I'm a follower of Christ who, unlike Mohammed, never condoned violence nor instructed any person to act violently towards another. Ever. There is no comparison between the two at all.
Except to a muslim apologist.
Matt: the problem is many here see you as trying to draw a moral equivalence between Islam and Biblical Christianity. One is of Satan the other is of God.
Ok, I get that. Now we're getting somewhere. I agree there is no comparison spiritually. However, my original point is that we need to very careful about avoiding facile points along the lines of "of course they're violent, what do you expect when their holy book containd encouragement to violence", when our own sacred texts aren't exactly squeaky clean on that front and have been used in our history to justify acts of violence (Crusades, wars of religion, executions for heresy and witchcraft).
No, that won't do as an argument: a far better one is that just suggested by Carpro - compare the lives and characters of Jesus and Mohammed.
No, that won't do as an argument: a far better one is that just suggested by Carpro - compare the lives and characters of Jesus and Mohammed.
One problem with bringing up the Crusades is many here do not view them as the result of Biblical Christianity.
Noted, which was why I was careful to refer to "executions for heresy and witchcraft" rather than merely the dreaded Spanish Inquisition, since neither branch of historical Christianity has covered itself in glory on that front.
But it's interesting you bring up the point, which skates close to the "No true Scotsman" fallacy, since that is the same argument out forward by moderate Muslims about Daesh ie: "but they're not Proper Muslims so they don't count"
But it's interesting you bring up the point, which skates close to the "No true Scotsman" fallacy, since that is the same argument out forward by moderate Muslims about Daesh ie: "but they're not Proper Muslims so they don't count"
Gold Dragon
Well-Known Member
I rarely agree with you carpro so i thought I should give you props when I do.
And while I am not a pacificist and I assume you are not either, I have great respect for my Christian brothers and sisters who do hold that view because they see pacificism as a vital part of the character of Christ and the character of the early church. In many ways I think pacifism is much more internally consistent with the Bible than my own view.
I sometimes wonder if the western world were really Christian and took the pacifistic approach to radical islamic terrorism, would God honour that somehow? It would be the ultimate step of faith to say, we have the power to fight and destroy these evil men, but we trust that God's love, grace and forgiveness are more powerful than guns, knives and explosives. The early church had that perspective. I know the counter arguments but the thought experiment is pretty frightening yet also fascinating to consider.
The OT has passages in which God was "encouraging or condoning genocide and other forms of violence", but note that they are past tense; I'm no Bible scholar, but I can't recall much present-tense language of that kind, at least not any that are directed at NT believers. As carpro has alluded, God in His omniscience knew that certain enemies of Israel would spiritually corrupt the Israelites if not done away with, and I believe God's all-knowing included the fact that none of those particular enemies would ever surrender to Him. We should be careful about conflating descriptive passages with prescriptive ones.
Did (and does) He know? or did He decree any and every event? If he is indeed all-knowing, how could he create all things and not know exactly the resulting effects?
Hmm...the command to Saul to destroy the Amalekites in I Sam 15 seems fairly prescriptive to me...
