Is Islam a "Religion of Peace"?

MarineTpartier said:

Why should I expand upon something that has been addressed ad nauseam? No need to waste the time posting it. There are better topics to debate and post about

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In other words, you can't back it up with even an attempt at articulation. Duly noted.

lizzie said:

There are plenty of people who are peaceful, who are also Muslim. As for the religion, the philosophy itself is not what I'd call peaceful at all, if taken literally.

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It depends on which parts. That book that Christians carry around is chock full of horrific violence and punishment for "sin", but most Christians today don't adhere to those parts, just as the vast majority of Muslims don't adhere to the more violent aspects of Islam.

German guy said:

Depends on your opinion on the relation between peace, order, submission and just war.

Some say war starts the moment someone refuses to submit. Some say a just war for a just cause is better than peace, and war is better than oppression.

Islam is not necessarily violent, but many Muslims today are. Many Christians especially in the past were too. And Moses led the Jewish people on a war of ethnic cleansing and genocide, which is the most important myth for the Jewish people.

IMO, it's true that Islam, unlike Christianity in the beginning, was spread by the sword. However, it is arguable whether it ended even more violence than it started, by ending the many pre-Muslim Arab clan wars and the everyday violence, by uniting the Arabs under Islam and limiting their sectarian violence and establishing social norms that limited violence within Arab communities. That Islam then spread even further is a different matter.

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Pretty nice opinion German guy.

matchlight said:

I'm not theologian enough to know if Islam is a "religion of peace," or not. But any Muslim nation whose leaders view it as a religion of violence had better have the forces to back it up, if they ever decide Allah has commanded them to attack much stronger opponents. Any nation like that could find itself on the receiving end of violence like its people have never even dreamed of.

Even seventy years ago, the U.S. and Britain both had bombers that could--and did--kill tens of thousands of people in a single night, in Hamburg, Tokyo, Dresden, and other cities. The bombers of today could probably do even more damage than that. And all this without needing to turn to nuclear weapons, of which the U.S. has six thousand or so, most of them many times more powerful than the two used on Japan in 1945.

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We're not likely going to be nuking anymore cities, or firebombing entire civilian populations anymore. I think that that was not a sign of strength, was recognised by several of the leaders of those crimes as war crimes, and I'm pretty sure (hopeful anyway) that those lessons have been learned. Containment would have been preferred for these people, and Hussein, Mubarak, Gaddafi and Assad did a fair job of it, until that is, they were removed.

Kreton said:

Almost no religion is violent. Assholes use religion to exercise violence. There is a difference.

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Then you've never read some of the religious books, they are filled with violence, sanctioned by and demanded by the gods.

Napoleon said:

Microscopic? I wouldn't consider, for example, the abduction of 25,000 children for use as soldiers and sex slaves and displacement of nearly 2 million people by The Lord's Resistance Army to be microscopic. Such atrocities committed by Christian terrorist organizations are not microscopic but they are under reported in favor of the evil Muslim boogeyman created by the media.

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The media created ISIS? Al Qaeda? The media just beheaded two of their own? Who knew!

Cephus said:

As I said, Christianity has had the moderating influence of secular society. 500 years ago, it was the Christians doing evil. Now it's the Muslims. Neither are inherently better than the other.

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Oh, but let Christians tell it.

TobyOne said:

300 isn't all that great. Its pretty good but not great.

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Exactly, and theirs quite a few here that it hasn't worked on, that's why I said 300, maybe its 315!

Napoleon said:

Microscopic? I wouldn't consider, for example, the abduction of 25,000 children for use as soldiers and sex slaves and displacement of nearly 2 million people by The Lord's Resistance Army to be microscopic. Such atrocities committed by Christian terrorist organizations are not microscopic but they are under reported in favor of the evil Muslim boogeyman created by the media.

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I wouldn't call the LRA "Christian", there views are obviously not orthodox and Wiki lists them as a cult.

radcen said:

In other words, you can't back it up with even an attempt at articulation. Duly noted.

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Correction, in other words, you're acting as if the recent headlines from the ME aren't the reason you posted this thread. This is the equivalent of someone posting about domestic violence in the NFL and acting like the Ray Rice incident isn't the reason for it.

Montecresto said:

We're not likely going to be nuking anymore cities, or firebombing entire civilian populations anymore. I think that that was not a sign of strength, was recognised by several of the leaders of those crimes as war crimes, and I'm pretty sure (hopeful anyway) that those lessons have been learned. Containment would have been preferred for these people, and Hussein, Mubarak, Gaddafi and Assad did a fair job of it, until that is, they were removed.

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I don't know why anyone would think decisions to bomb enemy cities during WWII were intended as a "sign of strength." Somehow I got the odd notion their purpose was to help defeat the enemy. The ability to send six or eight hundred bombers over a city in a single raid obviously did demonstrate the military strength of the U.S. and Britain. But if there's any evidence that was its usual purpose--or even that it ever was an important purpose--you haven't offered it.

Obviously you think actions like that were war crimes--you call them that. But who are the several "leaders of those crimes" you claim recognized them as crimes? It's clear neither Roosevelt or Churchill ever recognized any such thing.

What "lessons" are you claiming have been learned? And by whom? Your moral concern does not seem to reach the several hundred thousand Iraqis Saddam Hussein had slaughtered in various ways who were found in mass graves all over Iraq. You would have been just fine with letting that Arab version of the Cambodian killing fields go on indefinitely, and yet you glibly slander the United States as the perpetrator of war crimes. Did you learn your U.S. "history" from Howard Zinn, or some other America-hating Red?

Montecresto said:

Oh, but let Christians tell it.

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All religious groups think they're better than everyone else. It's not limited to Christians.

Cephus said:

All religious groups think they're better than everyone else. It's not limited to Christians.

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And you don't? :roll:

matchlight said:

I don't know why anyone would think decisions to bomb enemy cities during WWII were intended as a "sign of strength." Somehow I got the odd notion their purpose was to help defeat the enemy. The ability to send six or eight hundred bombers over a city in a single raid obviously did demonstrate the military strength of the U.S. and Britain. But if there's any evidence that was its usual purpose--or even that it ever was an important purpose--you haven't offered it.

Obviously you think actions like that were war crimes--you call them that. But who are the several "leaders of those crimes" you claim recognized them as crimes? It's clear neither Roosevelt or Churchill ever recognized any such thing.

What "lessons" are you claiming have been learned? And by whom? Your moral concern does not seem to reach the several hundred thousand Iraqis Saddam Hussein had slaughtered in various ways who were found in mass graves all over Iraq. You would have been just fine with letting that Arab version of the Cambodian killing fields go on indefinitely, and yet you glibly slander the United States as the perpetrator of war crimes. Did you learn your U.S. "history" from Howard Zinn, or some other America-hating Red?

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Robert McNamara,
Proportionality should be a guideline in war. Killing 50% to 90% of the people of 67 Japanese cities and then bombing them with two nuclear bombs is not proportional, in the minds of some people, to the objectives we were trying to achieve.
LeMay said, "If we'd lost the war, we'd all have been prosecuted as war criminals." And I think he's right. He, and I'd say I, were behaving as war criminals. LeMay recognized that what he was doing would be thought immoral if his side had lost. But what makes it immoral if you lose and not immoral if you win?

The Fog of War - Wikiquote

General (and later president) Dwight Eisenhower – then Supreme Commander of all Allied Forces, and the officer who created most of America’s WWII military plans for Europe and Japan – said:

The Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debate_over_the_atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki


Protocol 1, 1977, is when it was acknowledged that lessons had been learned, from both WW11 and Vietnam.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerial_bombardment_and_international_law

thereligionofpeace.com



Islamo-Apologists Be prepared for More Periodic postings to destroy your excuses and moral equivalence attempts.

Montecresto said:

Then you've never read some of the religious books, they are filled with violence, sanctioned by and demanded by the gods.

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Yet religious war is not a mandate for any religion but Islam.

I don't think Islam is a religion of peace.

One should compare Mohammed to Jesus Christ. Islam was founded by the prophet Mohammed. Here are some fun facts:

Mohammed, who never knew his father, was sexually violated (sodomized) as a youth.
* He held a grudge against everyone and took up the vocation as a slave trader.
* He made his money by buying and selling humans of all ages and race.
* Young strong slaves made good money for Mohammed. He sold young girls for sexual exploitation in Harems.
* Young male slaves were castrated and used for housework. Old and infirm were cheap and expendable.
* When they could no longer work they were killed off like old dogs.
* This was Mohammed’s business. This was how the false and heinous prophet-to-be made his money.
* This was the barbaric way of life that he was determined to preserve from the threat of Christianity.
* Although illiterate, he was a shrewd businessman who married his boss, an rich widow who was older than him by many years.
* He despised her with a vengeance. But when she died, he inherited all her wealth.
* He went on to have 13 wives and many concubines, whom he treated as personal property.
* Mohammed's youngest wife Ayesha, was only 6 years old when he engaged her and 9 years old when he married her and consummated their ‘marriage’!
* He bought her from her parents place because she was beautiful even as a child.
* He clearly had a voracious sexual appetite and was well known to be promiscuous.
* His life revolved around his harem, his slaves, battles and fooling people which his talk of god and satan.
* He always carried a knife or a sword. He killed many of his enemies by his own hand (a la Zarqawi who along with the accursed Mohammed is enjoying the Houris in Jan’aat - the Muslim heaven).
Mohammed personally abused, castrated, flogged and killed rebellious slaves.
* Through his brigandage, he became very rich and influential.
* His ideals of human rights extended only to his own faithful followers of Islamic brotherhood (Ummah).
* All infidels or non-Muslims were fair game for conquest or enslavement.
* He began to claim he was in direct personal contact with some god.
* There are good and bad persons in every society. Like Hitler, Mohammed courted those who were bad and evil like him.
* He commanded his faithful followers and associates to believe him without questioning his quthority.
* Mohammed put his evil band made up of Ali, Umar and the like in control of his society.
* He dictated his God's words, whom he called Allah, and ordered his followers to memorize these words.
* He borrowed some Jewish and Christian doctrines and combined them with his brand of depravity.
* It was a pick and mix of the good with the bad and he called it Islam.
* Islam means submission of Kafirs to the will of the Muslims of women to the will of their fathers, husbands sons and sons-in-law.
* It is clear today for all to see and experience that evil that Islam represents.
* All Islamic women, our mothers and sisters, live a life of extreme fear.
* He called it a new religion and proclaimed himself god's prophet.
* He nominated one deity, Allah, as his god, emphasizing Allah as the one true god(sic).
History of Jihad

Now Christ got mad and overturned some tables of the moneychangers outside the temple.
But otherwise, was peaceful.

Which religion is more peaceful?

Gardener said:

Yet religious war is not a mandate for any religion but Islam.

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But one of so many examples in the Christian bible.

1Samuel 15:3;

Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.'"

American said:

What ?

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Yep; that's exactly right. Read your history.

Montecresto said:

But one of so many examples in the Christian bible.

1Samuel 15:3;

Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.'"

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A handful of specific incidents does not even remotely equal a continuous mandate.

radcen said:

A handful of specific incidents does not even remotely equal a continuous mandate.

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Oh, there's much more then a handful. Did you note that god ordered them to kill the women and children, yes INFANTS and all livestock. Very Nice.

SouthernDemocrat said:

There only a few "religions of peace". Some sects of Buddhism, Jainism, a minority of Christianity - basically the peace Churches... these are about the only "religions of peace" out there. The problem with Islam is its your basic religion of law combined with a violent culture.

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Define religion of peace.

Although non violence is certainly a religious principle, there is no such thing as a religion that advocates absolute non violence. The act of eating requires violence to some sort of living thing.

radcen said:

Is Islam a "Religion of Peace"?

Yes?
No?
Yes and no?
Something else?

Please give some thoughts behind your conclusion.

Bonus question: In your opinion, why did Bush II go out of his way to refer to it as such after 9/11? Do you think he actually believed it? Do you think he was trying to keep people (us and them) calm?

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By "it", I assume you're referring to Islam. What exactly did GWB call it? A religion of peace/peaceful religion? What?

SouthernDemocrat said:

There only a few "religions of peace". Some sects of Buddhism, Jainism, a minority of Christianity - basically the peace Churches... these are about the only "religions of peace" out there. The problem with Islam is its your basic religion of law combined with a violent culture.

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Christianity was like that during the Mosaic period. Just read the books of Joshua thru Isaiah for evidence. According to the Bible, early on after the days of Moses and until the late 600 BC, the Israelites were constantly at war with someone in the name of God (or rather because He said so for land) or because another nation decided to war against them (again, for land). Throughout Old Testament times there were ritual laws for damned near everything - cleanliness, prayer, marriage, child birth, entering God's holy temple, etc., etc., you name it there was a law and/or ritual for it. And in some cases if you disobeyed the law, it could be fatal for you (i.e., stoning and I don't mean the kind that's been legalized in Colorado either).

Islam still follows many of the Old Testament rituals and/or tenants. In many ways it is a backwards religion. Nonetheless, it is a peaceful religion at its core just as is Christianity. The problem is men (and women) have subverted the Muslim religion much as early Roman Catholic Priests once subverted Christianity, i.e., the Crusaded.