Which Koran are we quoting?

[Dragoon68]

None of the Muslims I know. Maybe you are habging out with the wrong crowd.

I don't hang around much with any crowd and, in general, I try to run in the opposite direction.

 

[amity]

This is factually untrue. Muslim web sites will tell us all that and those who don't research history will buy into that lie while islamic apologists and elitists continue to assert that islam is a peaceful religion, but the historical facts tell the true story. Let us not forget the "infidel tax" that is paid to muslims for the privilege of living under their rule once indiginous people are conquered and allowed to be spared from the sword.

Historical records bear out just how well indigenous people have been treated after muslims took over. Like how the Armenian Christians have been treated by muslims after muslims took over their non-islamic territory.

http://www.armenian-genocide.org/photointro.html

Or we could go back to the conquest of muslims over the Byzantine Empire.

We could discuss the Assyrian Christians of Iraq after muslims took over.

Or the Copts of Egypt after islam conquered North Africa.

Or Afghanistan.

Or Sudan.

Or Sierra Leone.

Or why the nation of Lebanon was originally created/chartered.

To name a few.

Or we can talk about Christian persecution in (now) muslim countries in 2007.

Over 250 MILLION Christians will be persecuted in 2007 - primarily at the hand of islamists. (A few million in China and North Korea, but primarily the rest are in what are now nations that have been conquered by islamists.)

Actually I got I think it was either 12 or 15 college credits in Middle Eastern history at an ivy league college in Massachusetts. Our textbook was mainly the Cambridge History, so hardly Islamist apologetics. People of the Book i.e. Christians or Jews who are under the millet system, were exempt from regular taxes and paid only the special tax, most of which supported their autonomous communities within the Muslim state. This was predominantly an Ottoman practice, but was also the practice before and after the Ottomans elsewhere in the Middle East. In reality this is no longer in practice anywhere, however. These are modern nation states now with regular citizenship for native-born people. In countries that do not have a native Christian population, evangelism is usually prohibited. Foreigners (i.e., missionaries) are not allowed to attempt to convert Muslims. I am afraid the missionaries of the olden days wore out their welcome in many places. Christians meet for worship in private houses, and that is tolerated everywhere, even in Saudi Arabia which is the very strictest about such things. You can take a Bible in. You cannot take 1000 Bibles in, however. You cannot take 10 boxes of religious tracts in, either.Qatar also does not have publicly visible churches, and also private meetings are allowed. Most other countries do have visible churches, even in 100% entirely Muslim countries like the United Arab Emirates, for example.

Frankly I have lived in various places in the world, including several Muslim countries, and the only ones who I have ever heard of attacking Christians are people on the fringes of society. One of the places I lived was in Lebanon, and as God in heaven is my witness I could never identify with what the "Christians" there were doing. I was terrified of the Christians in Lebanon during the war. I mean the Kataeb. I won't go into graphic details of what they were up to. I saw the results. They would wear these enormous crosses, maybe one foot high, and I would head in the other direction, believe me. People had just lost their minds under the stress. But honestly at that time I felt MUCH safer in the Muslim or Druze areas. You would have, too. So at any rate, there is probably always more to these simplistic little propaganda stories about Christian persecution than is reported.

Look, I will be online for another few minutes and then tomorrow I will probably not be online at all. Big doings at church most of the day.

 

[amity]

The problem here is that because it involved Muslims it's being considered a "hate crime" and that's completely wrong.

No, if the victims were Jews it would also be a hate crime to throw a ham steak on their table. If a beefsteak was thrown on a dining table of Hindus that would also be a hate crime.

 

[LadyEagle]

One of the places I lived was in Lebanon, and as God in heaven is my witness I could never identify with what the "Christians" there were doing. I was terrified of the Christians in Lebanon during the war. I mean the Kataeb. I won't go into graphic details of what they were up to. I saw the results. They would wear these enormous crosses, maybe one foot high, and I would head in the other direction, believe me. People had just lost their minds under the stress. But honestly at that time I felt MUCH safer in the Muslim or Druze areas. You would have, too. So at any rate, there is probably always more to these simplistic little propaganda stories about Christian persecution than is reported.

You certainly had a different experience than others have had, Christians I know who fled Lebanon. And different from that of Brigitte Gabriel who says:

I was born in Lebanon and raised as a Christian. When the Lebanese Civil War broke out, our family, and our Maronite community came under vicious attack by Islamic extremists. They promised to destroy us, and as you know from the recent war in Lebanon, the country is now nearly Islamic.

http://americancongressfortruth.com/

 

[amity]

You certainly had a different experience than others have had, Christians I know who fled Lebanon. And different from that of Brigitte Gabriel who says:

I was born in Lebanon and raised as a Christian. When the Lebanese Civil War broke out, our family, and our Maronite community came under vicious attack by Islamic extremists. They promised to destroy us, and as you know from the recent war in Lebanon, the country is now nearly Islamic.​

http://americancongressfortruth.com/

Yes, I most definitely did. Ms. Gabriel was probably hiding behind a mattress in her house for the entire year, relying on her partisan brothers for information about what was going on. As a neutral party I was out in it quite a bit more, and amazingly blessed to be here still.

But in reality as I said, EVERYONE seemed to have lost their minds. The Kataeb just seemed crazier than average. They tended to kill anyone who wasn't Maronite on sight for safety's sake. That was the danger, their beleaguered mentality, I suppose. I wasn't Maronite.

 

[2 Timothy2:1-4]

Oh, dry up. Honesty is always in order.

So you want some honesty do you? Well try these links on for size and see just how much truth you really want:


http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/644554/posts

http://www.cbn.com/spirituallife/ch...history/crusades_canerchristianjihad0505.aspx

"Dr. Ergun Caner: I was a Muslim for half my life, until I was almost twenty. The only thing I ever learned about Christianity I learned from my Imam and the scholars in the mosque. Then when I began to be trained in Madras we heard even more about Christians, that they are our enemies. I would guess that the key word that we would call the Americans was the Crusaders. Right after the bombing of 9/11, when the first bin Ladin tape was released, he called us Crusaders. The Fatwa that was signed February 23rd, 1998 referred to us as the Crusaders. This is because from our world mindset -- one side of my family is Wahabi, the other side is Sunni Orthodox -- this is fundamental to understanding how they view America."






http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=027454a783c841250ba7


We have an apologist for the murderous Islam for sure.

 

[amity]

I hate to admit it, but many of us do sound like Crusaders, so I guess the imam was right on that score.

 

[LadyEagle]

OBTW, about my earlier post - here is a history of jihad (struggle):

http://historyofjihad.org/sitemap.html

And this is about the Third Jihad:

WASHINGTON — In the eyes of a fanatical and resolute minority of Muslims, the third wave of attack on Christendom and Europe has clearly begun.

The first wave dates from the very beginning of Islam, when the new faith spilled out of the Arabian Peninsula, where it was born, into the Middle East and beyond. It was then that Muslims conquered Syria, Palestine, Egypt and North Africa — all at that time part of the Christian world — and went beyond into Europe. There, they conquered a sizable part of southwestern Europe, including Spain, Portugal and southern Italy, all of which became part of the Islamic world, and even crossed the Pyrenees and occupied for a while parts of France.

The second wave was conducted not by Arabs and Moors but by Turks and Tartars. In the mid-13th century, the Mongol conquerors of Russia were converted to Islam. The Turks, who had already conquered Anatolia, advanced into Europe and in 1453 they captured the ancient Christian citadel of Constantinople. They conquered a large part of the Balkans, and for a while ruled half of Hungary. Twice they reached as far as Vienna, to which they laid siege in 1529 and again in 1683. Barbary corsairs from North Africa went to Iceland — the uttermost limit — and to several places in Western Europe, including notably a raid on Baltimore (the original one, in Ireland) in 1631.

The third wave is taking a different form: terror and migration. The subject of terror has been discussed frequently and in great detail. What I want to address here is the other aspect, which is of more particular relevance to Europe today — the question of migration.

http://www.islam-watch.org/Others/Muslims-Migration-Third-Attack-Europe.htm

From the website:
Islam Under Scrutiny by Ex-Muslims -

http://www.islam-watch.org

 

[amity]

None of that is a patch on the military aggression committed by "Christian" countries over that same time span, is it?

More on jihad. This is what you need to know:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jihad

Folks, I have to go to bed because I have to get up early tomorrow to cook. As a final post, I am going to tell you what is really going on, in a nutshell.

We have made many people in Muslim countries, especially in the Middle East, very angry with our atrocious foreign policies in that area. When I was there, the prevailing sentiment was moderate leftist throughout the Middle East. I wish I had a dime for every time someone told me that while they liked and respected Americans personally, U.S. foreign policy was inhumane. They wanted secular democratic republics (very similar to the U.S! How's about that!). We should have given that aspiration our full support while we had the chance.

Instead, the Israeli government through clandestine operations managed to convert this feeling into some rather unfortunate right wing sentiment. Yes, this has been exposed in the Israeli press and is an acknowledged fact. They supported Hamas against Fateh for a long period. They also supported right wing politics in Lebanon and elsewhere throughout the Middle East. They are sorry now, but it is too late. The tide of public opinion has emphatically shifted toward the right, the Islamic right.

Your problem is not with Islam, it is with right wing politics. Just like right wing politics in the West has always drawn on religion to increase its popular support, so can right wing politics in the Middle East. The madder people get, the more appeal it has. Meanwhile, Islam is basically what it always has been ... not a particularly violent religion, no more violent than the Old Testament, as I have said. Most of what is in the Koran on this subject relates to circumstances with the local idolators during Mohammed's own time. Can it be turned against the U.S. or other Western interests? Of course. The main appeal of the Islamic republic idea is not that it strengthens Islam, (which is plenty strong already and is the very fabric of many people's lives, just as Christianity is for us); it is that it asserts self-control and identity.

At any rate, if we change our foreign policy attitudes will change. They are right, we have been and are oppressing them. We need to change that. Islam will continue probably until the Lord comes again, but Islam is not the problem. To imagine that all those very nice and normal people are in reality harboring some secret conspiracy against Christendom is too ridiculous. Just stay out of their affairs and you will find no more enemies there. It is that simple.

 

[LadyEagle]

hate to admit it, but many of us do sound like Crusaders

Do you have a sound byte for what a Crusader sounds like?

Technically speaking, the Crusades were started by muslims warring to take over non-muslim lands. Of course, history revisionists, islamic apologists, and the elite always throw the Crusades into every debate about islam (also known in debating tactics as a straw man, or red herring, and finally the old poisoning the well ploy), as if it were the other way around and the Crusaders were the aggressors against muslims.

Good night. I'm outta here for now. Big day tomorrow. :sleeping_2:

 

[LadyEagle]

None of that is a patch on the military aggression committed by "Christian" countries over that same time span, is it?

I am not aware of any official Christian countries where people are governed by Christianity and where Christianity is the official state religion.

 

[amity]

I am not aware of any official Christian countries where people are governed by Christianity and where Christianity is the official state religion.

The U.S. was the first secular country of all time. 1776. ALL countries before the U.S. had official state religions. Many or even most still do:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_religion

 

[DHK]

The U.S. was the first secular country of all time. 1776. ALL countries before the U.S. had official state religions. Many or even most still do:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_religion

Official starte religion or not, there has never been a nation in history that has been a true Christian theocracy under God except for Israel itself. And there never will be until the Millennial Kingdom. To this day, England has a state church--the Church of England, but that doesn't make England a Christian nation. It is not. Far from it. If there was any nation at the present time that needs missionaries it would be England. We live in a time where famous old churches in London are now being turned into mosques. Britain is secular and humanistic (like America), but certainly not Christian.

Because nations have state-religions it makes them no more Christian than the devil himself. There is no such thing, nor ever will be as a "Christian" nation.

 

[carpro]

Oh, dry up. Honesty is always in order.

Agreed.

So when do you start? Being honest, that is.

Misrepresenting what the Koran says is hardly honest.

 

[carpro]

None of that is a patch on the military aggression committed by "Christian" countries over that same time span, is it?

More on jihad. This is what you need to know:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jihad

Folks, I have to go to bed because I have to get up early tomorrow to cook. As a final post, I am going to tell you what is really going on, in a nutshell.

We have made many people in Muslim countries, especially in the Middle East, very angry with our atrocious foreign policies in that area.

Of course, it's all our fault.

What else is new?

Maybe they should try to just, you know, get over it.

Of course, I'm not real happy with the foreign policy of middle eastern nations, either. It seems to be a little too centered around killing "infidels", but if no "infidels" are handy, muslims seem to be more than happy to kill each other.

 

[Dragoon68]

And I am equally certain that the word "infidel," no matter how it may be used by some, is used in the Koran to refer to idolators. Christians and Jews do have a special status in Islam, different than unbelievers.

The New Oxford Dictionary defines infidel to mean "a person who has no religion or whose religion is not that of the majority, adhering to a religion other than that of the majority" and explains that "The word originally denoted a person of a religion other than one's own, specifically a Muslim (to a Christian), a Christian (to a Muslim), or a Gentile (to a Jew)."

The New Oxford Thesaurus gives sysnonoms for infidel to include "unbeliever, disbeliever, non-believer, heathen, pagan, idolater, idolatress, heretic, agnostic, atheist, nihilist, apostate, freethinker, libertine, dissenter, nonconformist"

Wikipedia, an open user edited but often reliable source, defines infidel to mean "In Islam, the Arabic word kafir (كافر) refers to a person who denies Allah or the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It can also refer to non-Muslims, often in a derogatory sense, and is usually translated into English as "infidel" or "unbeliever"."

So, when advocates of radical Islamic ideas mention "infidels", they are referring to us Christians - among others - with an enmity that's not beyond real violence. The only "special status" we have with these advocates is their deep desire to crush not only our person but also our belief.

 

[Dragoon68]

No, if the victims were Jews it would also be a hate crime to throw a ham steak on their table. If a beefsteak was thrown on a dining table of Hindus that would also be a hate crime.

The whole concept of "hate crimes" is nothing more than an attempt by a small minority of people to use the federal government to further usurp the power of the state and the people. There's no reason for something that's a "crime" by state law to be elevated to a "hate crime" just so that in can fall under the jurisdiction of federal law. The acts of the child involved do not consitute a crime much less a "hate crime"!

Regardless, rudeness never was and should not be regulated by state or federal law. If that is incorrect, then there are many areas of our society that should be corrected perhaps being with the domain most frequented by politicians. It may not be good conduct but we just don't need any level of government sticking their nose into the matter. Muslims, Jews, Hindus, etc. or Christians need not be given the force of law to act against rudeness. Government's role, with respect to individual misconduct, is to react to crimes of serious nature for the sake of providing a system of justice that individuals should not undertake for their own vengeance. It's purpose is not to regulate the thoughts, conversations, and ordinary squabbles between people whether good or bad. It's a dangerous step in the on-going trend to regulate everything minor while ignoring the major duties of government.

John Adams said: "This form of government ... is productive of everything which is great and excellent among men. But its principles are as easily destroyed as human nature is corrupted. ... A government is only to be supported by pure religion of austere morals. Private and public virtue is the only foundation of republics."

I'm certain that similar acts of rudeness against Christians would not be met with same response. In fact, it's obvious that the government is being used in a hostile manner towards the practice of Christianity by its consistent attempts to forcefully remove all evidence and practice of Christianity from public view using a misinterpretation of the first and fourteenth amendments that's evolved over the last fifty years. This modern trend replaced about one hundred fifty years of relative common sense not including the several hundred years prior during which the fundamentals of our nation were being developed.

 

[Dragoon68]

... At any rate, if we change our foreign policy attitudes will change. They are right, we have been and are oppressing them. We need to change that. Islam will continue probably until the Lord comes again, but Islam is not the problem. To imagine that all those very nice and normal people are in reality harboring some secret conspiracy against Christendom is too ridiculous. Just stay out of their affairs and you will find no more enemies there. It is that simple.

I completely disagree with the sentiment of these statements!

We have most certainly not been "oppressing them" or any other nation on earth. The turth is the very opposite of that! America certainly has its faults but oppressing other nations is not one of them. We've consistently come to the aide of oppressed people around the world because it's been in our national interests to do so and because we care about what happens to others in this world.

No other nation has done that to the extent nor cost - blood and money - that America has. There are times when the details might be debated but the intents should be clear from the evidence of two centuries. Others have expanded their empires, plundered the conquered territories, and enslaved people under dictators, tyrants, and communists. We have remained a model of hope for representative government that fosters individual liberty, prosperity, pursuit of happiness, and, most of all, freedom of religion.

Any other deduction is a completely narrowly focused or blinded view of history sympathetic of the views of opposing forces.

I'm sure there are many people of the Islamic faith around the world who desire the benefits of the aforementioned model but yet prefer to keep their faith and also are not actively seeking to kill every Christian on the face of the earth. It's not our charter much less within our ability to make them become Christians. Only the Holy Spirit can convict a person to recognize their salvation and only the Lord can choose them. I'm certain among this false religion there are extremes of practice ranging from indifference to radical. The most radical are the ones that pose the initial threat.

That, however, does not take away from the message embodied in the Koran and exhibited by the conduct of some many of the nations centered around Islamic law.

The Holy Bible records: "For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life." (Romans 5:10) and "Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God." (James 4:4). In this matter I apply it mean that Allah and his followers are enemies of God and I need to be very careful as to how "friendly" I become with his followers.

There is room for co-existence on this planet with some degree of tolerance in the interest of temporal peace. We are, however, fools if we believe that further importing this "peaceful" religion into our land will not bring about the same types of problems being experienced between peoples of areas such as the Middle East.

God may eventually choose not to continue the many blessings He has given our if He finds that we have, as a whole, fallen away and become consumed by belief in false gods. That is what we should fear most of all!

 

[LadyEagle]

Meanwhile, Islam is basically what it always has been ... not a particularly violent religion, no more violent than the Old Testament, as I have said. Most of what is in the Koran on this subject relates to circumstances with the local idolators during Mohammed's own time. Can it be turned against the U.S. or other Western interests? Of course. The main appeal of the Islamic republic idea is not that it strengthens Islam, (which is plenty strong already and is the very fabric of many people's lives, just as Christianity is for us); it is that it asserts self-control and identity.

Yes, of course - self control and identity. Tell that to the 10s of thousands of children and women who have their genitals mutilated. Tell that to the thousands of women who are killed in "honor" killings---some even happening in islamic communities in the west (Europe). Tell that to women who were forced to cover themselves from head to toe in burqas and forced to beg in order to feed their children under hard-line Taliban/Sharia law in Afghanistan. Tell that to the children who were abducted and killed in Afghanistan to have their organs sold on the black market, or to the young boys who were victims of pedophilia from the Taliban. Tell that to the children who are forced into islamic slavery and prostitution in muslim countries, even as we speak. Tell that to those poor Christian saints, pastors, and missionaries who have had their villages burned and their families slaughtered by machetes in Africa by roving islamic groups out to destroy infidels. Tell that to the tribal children abducted by muslims in Africa who are fed drugs and trained to slaughter innocent villagers with AK-47s shouting allah akbar.

(Warning: Some material in the following link is true, but graphic.)

http://www.middle-east-info.org/gateway/womenchildabuse/

True followers of mohammed denigrate and abuse women and children.

In fact, it is Christianity, Jesus Christ Himself, Who elevated women and children to not be treated like dogs. It is in the Judeo-Christian countries that there are such things as child labor laws.

You have convinced me by now that no matter how many links are posted on this thread regarding the historical and present day facts about islam, no matter how many times you are shown what is really written in the quran, you will continue to defend islam. You have been shown from your own source that what has been written in the quran is undeniable. Yet, you continue to defend or make excuses for what is in the quran and for the muslim religion. We have gone full circle with you, as with other islamic apologists who have been here on the BB, (the usual arguments are the Crusades, Oklahoma City, abortion clinic bombings, KKK, and finally, how everything wrong with islamic countries is because of the foreign policy of the United States or Israel. Last but not least, is the usual charge that is leveled against those who dare speak the truth - hate speech and the B word (bigot). We have heard it all before and it has all been posted on these forums before.)

Up until now, you have been given some laxity here on this board to state your case and you have been given the opportunity to debate - but defending islam - which is clearly anti-Christianity - is against the board rules, the board rules which you agreed to when you joined here. This is not the right board to serve as a forum to defend islamic beliefs, or the "peaceful religion" mantra, or what is written in the quran, so therefore, this thread is now being closed.


As a final point, I would like to state that it is our Christian responsibility to not only speak the truth about islam and all false religions and ideologies, but also to pray for those (especially in the 10/40 window) who are entrapped, ensnared, and destined to an eternal hell without Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, that many might continue to come to a saving knowledge of Him, the TRUE God, the Son of the Living God.

God is doing great things in these areas of the world through the Jesus Film Project, thru SAT-7 Christian satellite television, and other areas - people are being saved, healed, and ex-muslims are willing to die and are being killed and tortured for Jesus Christ. Oh that those of us who are not persecuted may be found as faithful and true.

May we all, who have blessed with the truth and with freedom, be found faithful to Him and continue to support these mission efforts through our financial support and prayers. It is not His will that any should perish but that all should come to repentence.

Pray for the persecuted Christians

http://www.persecution.org

http://www.opendoors.org

Amen?

Lady Eagle,
Moderator