Comparative Religions
As I will explore in future postings on "comparative religions", Islam is a uniquely and unequivocally evil ideology, completely unlike any other major world religion.
For the simple reason that though there are surely many paths to God / Prime Mover, this "Allah" isn't God, even as understood by atheists and agnostics, but is more closely identifiable with Moloch / Baal / Satan.
Now before you call the PC Police on me for these insensitive comments, I ask you to consider, why is it so inconceivable that a religio-political ideology could be evil? Isn't it within the realm of possibility?
I mean, surely one can agree that Nazism was a real religio-political ideology, it was evil, and its adherents are justifiably considered bad people, who had a choice in what they believed, and freely chose to believe a destructive philosphy, and deserve all the punishment they get?
(And don't give me the "but Hitler was a Christian!" argument; please, willful ignorance is unbecoming. Though born technically to Christian parents, his Nazi philosophy was explicitly pagan, based in Aryan mythology.)
So why must Islam, or any other religion, be given a free pass from such scrutiny?
The answer: it shouldn't.
I mean, either God exists or He does not. If you believe in God, then you must accept belief in an opposiste force, which goes by many names but we'll call Satan. Is it not then not merely plausible, but probable, that Satan, Lord of Lies, would exercise his will through a deceptive perversion of God's works?
On the other hand, if you don't believe in God, then all ideologies and religions are pure human constructs, and rather than simply dismissing them all as equally flawed, isn't it inevitable that given human imperfections, that some of these belief-systems would be far worse for humanity than others? And wouldn't it be prudent to discern which caused net evil and which caused net good, even if all are fantasies? If anything, the real puzzle is why MORE religions aren't unequivocally evil from this point of view!
And spare me ill-informed comments about "bad things" that have been done by members of other religions -- that misses the point entirely about the basic teachings I'm trying to make, and I'll deal with it fully very soon. So save it.
That people can do bad things, even in the name of religion, is no surprise. Duh. It's to be expected. The real interesting question is what utility various religoius philosphies have for daily living and human interaction.
Also don't bother with pointing to passages in Deuteronomy or Leviticus that seem harsh by today's standards. The words of a Jewish law-giver back in the Bronze Age of 4,000 years ago are interesting, but not particularly relevant for how Christianity, for example, is practiced today. We're not called "Levitians", are we? And with good reason. That any law at all existed back in those days was in itself a big step forward for humanity. I don't see any admonishment in the Bible that those words are to be followed to the letter; do you? Furthermore, many dictates at that ancient time by God to the Israelites were often very specific as to time and place, and don't have general applicability. The "universal" Divine Words of God in the Bible are limited to things like the 10 Commandments, and the sermons of Jesus.
I defy anyone to find one shred of evidence in the actual words of Jesus to advocate hurting people or spreading HIs Word by force.
On the other hand, the koran directly advocate both of those things, and straight from the moth of mohammed the prophet, as the pure word of Allah.
Surely you see the difference? The difference between, for example, a warning of what God will do to someone, versus a direct order to go out and do it to them yourself?
And I stress, I'm not setting out to ridicule various methods of worship, which may seem silly; all religions have "odd" features about them. That's not what I'm interested in. Nor am I interested in worrying about fine points of theology, like which religion is "right" about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, or over whether the "true nature" of God is a unity or a trinity or whatever. That's not fruitful.
Instead, I'm interested only in the consequences that result from following the dictates of the religions' founders -- the impact these teachings have on the quality of human life.
Surely that's a valid, indeed vital, field of inquiry.
Assuming all religions are the same in this regard (usually dismissed as all equally invalid by the pseudo-intellectual) is naive.
And a deadly dangerous mistake.
Reality has a way of intruding into politically-correct fantasies: we're not Schrodinger cats.
For the simple reason that though there are surely many paths to God / Prime Mover, this "Allah" isn't God, even as understood by atheists and agnostics, but is more closely identifiable with Moloch / Baal / Satan.
Now before you call the PC Police on me for these insensitive comments, I ask you to consider, why is it so inconceivable that a religio-political ideology could be evil? Isn't it within the realm of possibility?
I mean, surely one can agree that Nazism was a real religio-political ideology, it was evil, and its adherents are justifiably considered bad people, who had a choice in what they believed, and freely chose to believe a destructive philosphy, and deserve all the punishment they get?
(And don't give me the "but Hitler was a Christian!" argument; please, willful ignorance is unbecoming. Though born technically to Christian parents, his Nazi philosophy was explicitly pagan, based in Aryan mythology.)
So why must Islam, or any other religion, be given a free pass from such scrutiny?
The answer: it shouldn't.
I mean, either God exists or He does not. If you believe in God, then you must accept belief in an opposiste force, which goes by many names but we'll call Satan. Is it not then not merely plausible, but probable, that Satan, Lord of Lies, would exercise his will through a deceptive perversion of God's works?
On the other hand, if you don't believe in God, then all ideologies and religions are pure human constructs, and rather than simply dismissing them all as equally flawed, isn't it inevitable that given human imperfections, that some of these belief-systems would be far worse for humanity than others? And wouldn't it be prudent to discern which caused net evil and which caused net good, even if all are fantasies? If anything, the real puzzle is why MORE religions aren't unequivocally evil from this point of view!
And spare me ill-informed comments about "bad things" that have been done by members of other religions -- that misses the point entirely about the basic teachings I'm trying to make, and I'll deal with it fully very soon. So save it.
That people can do bad things, even in the name of religion, is no surprise. Duh. It's to be expected. The real interesting question is what utility various religoius philosphies have for daily living and human interaction.
Also don't bother with pointing to passages in Deuteronomy or Leviticus that seem harsh by today's standards. The words of a Jewish law-giver back in the Bronze Age of 4,000 years ago are interesting, but not particularly relevant for how Christianity, for example, is practiced today. We're not called "Levitians", are we? And with good reason. That any law at all existed back in those days was in itself a big step forward for humanity. I don't see any admonishment in the Bible that those words are to be followed to the letter; do you? Furthermore, many dictates at that ancient time by God to the Israelites were often very specific as to time and place, and don't have general applicability. The "universal" Divine Words of God in the Bible are limited to things like the 10 Commandments, and the sermons of Jesus.
I defy anyone to find one shred of evidence in the actual words of Jesus to advocate hurting people or spreading HIs Word by force.
On the other hand, the koran directly advocate both of those things, and straight from the moth of mohammed the prophet, as the pure word of Allah.
Surely you see the difference? The difference between, for example, a warning of what God will do to someone, versus a direct order to go out and do it to them yourself?
And I stress, I'm not setting out to ridicule various methods of worship, which may seem silly; all religions have "odd" features about them. That's not what I'm interested in. Nor am I interested in worrying about fine points of theology, like which religion is "right" about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, or over whether the "true nature" of God is a unity or a trinity or whatever. That's not fruitful.
Instead, I'm interested only in the consequences that result from following the dictates of the religions' founders -- the impact these teachings have on the quality of human life.
Surely that's a valid, indeed vital, field of inquiry.
Assuming all religions are the same in this regard (usually dismissed as all equally invalid by the pseudo-intellectual) is naive.
And a deadly dangerous mistake.
Reality has a way of intruding into politically-correct fantasies: we're not Schrodinger cats.
posted by RDS at 4:47 PM
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