A season for feasting

I wonder what he was *really* thinking???

None of the "kinder, gentler" stuff from this camp.

Compare your Infidel culture’s history with that of the great Arab Muslim City of Baghdad. History International aired a history of Baghdad this afternoon. I took notes. For ready reference, I’ve put ‘timeline things’ up top and ‘color commentary’ things below:

1. Baghdad was a decent Muslim military outpost and nice place to live for a hundred or so years after becoming Islamicized. They had a school and grew food.
2. After the hundred years, Baghdad fell into disrepair due to bloody infighting and lack of maintenance.
3. It stayed that way until conquered by the Mongols.
4. The Mongols left and Baghdad fell into disrepair due to bloody infighting and lack of maintenance until conquered by the Ottoman Empire. After which it pretty much stayed in disrepair.
5. The British took over after WWI and established a Kingdom.
6. The British left in 1932 (‘because the society was so advanced’).
7. Someone built a dam and a bunch of poor squatters moved in.
8. A bloody revolution in 1958 heralded the opening of Iraq’s ‘Golden Era’, a period when a couple of monuments were built. One of the monuments was a small arch.
9. Military coups created a succession of military governments during this Golden Era of ten years.
10. Baath Party takes over in 1968 and the Golden Era ends.
11. A ‘New Iraqi Economy’ is established in the 1970s as the Iraqis learn to collect oil royalties. Some houses are built.
12. Saddam takes over in 1979. Saddam knocks over the small arch and paints his picture lots of places. Saddam City is named.
13. The Americans target Iraq’s middle class with sanctions, upsetting the fabric of Iraqi society.
14. The Americans steal Iraq’s rich cultural heritage as Iraqis loot their own museum.

Rich Cultural History. City of Peace. Blah Blah. Tremendous Artwork. Prominent Architecture. Blah. ‘This is not a third-world country, this is a first-world country driven down by a crazy Dictator.’ ‘Return the Capitol to its former glory.’ ‘15,000 school buildings 80% need urgent repair. We will require 4,500 new schools.’

Thanks for the warning Robert. Good luck with the book.

The words of Jesus are one of enlightment and all that one would need to become a model human being.
your comparisons between Christianity and Islam comes at a most important time. The muslims say that Christians strayed away from God's words, l would say not, and that monsterous muhammud created misery upon the earth. If l were more relgious, l would say muhammud and his followers were the antiChrist. Robert may your works enlighten many more of us!

If you look at any other faith with the exception of Islam the "heroes" or central figures of that faith are good. They do noble things or brave things. These heroes give a reaffirmation of right over wrong and of brave action and justice. Islam is the only religion that the central figure is such a problem. All other faiths can reform to fit the modern world without giving up their central figures or teachings. Islam it appears cannot not. Muhammad appears to teach nothing new in terms of good conduct and what he does new is just not acceptable in a modern world.

Thus it defines two worlds. Not just a Western vs. Islamic BUT a Modern vs. Islamic. India is not western but there is no reason it cannot be modern. Japan is not western but is modern. I suppose you could say modern is western but all things change. So modern civilization works on certain norms based on a western style past. Islam has different norms. The followers of Muhammad just can't live in this world of today....East or West.

Like I said it is going to be a long war...

To read the ramblings of the founder of the modern terrorist theocracy of Iran should make clear to any rational person with the semblance of a brain that negotiations, peace talks, or any other form of civilized and logical discussion is even more ludicrous than trying to appease Hitler or Stalin.

I am not a Christian and the Bible is not my book, but it is startling to put the two statements together in one post as Robert has done. If there actually were such a thing as an anti-Christ, no person who ever lived could ever fill that role more surely than Mohammed. In every way, that inhuman monster and all the evil he spawned has accomplished, and continues to accomplish, as much human suffering, repression, and pointless death as any satan could ever dream of. All while fooling so many followers, and duping so many who go through life with their eyes closed and in a state of denial. It is almost enough to make an infidel find faith.

These two passages represent a stark contrast between megalomania and love. But let there be no doubt, love is more powerful because it reflects the practical and hard-earned wisdom that society can only function well if people cooperate. That's why (almost!) all major religions preach brotherhood: It works. But let's not underestimate the appeal of raw power. Real religion is always at war with base human nature. Sometimes the bad guys win, but only if we let them.
Happy Pesach!

I wrote long on this subject, hit a wrong key and lost it. Now I will write short on it.
Any harmful acts perpetrated by anyone calling themselves Christians, have little or nothing to do with Christianity. Some Christians (so called) have done harmful things. Sometimes in the name of God.
So what? What has this got to do with God? Anyone can claim anything they want, and it has zero effect on God or Jesus. Christianity does not advocate harm. Christianity in its essence, advocates love.
Islam is the exact opposite. It has everything to do with Allah. Its core literature are ripe with harmful statements, directions and deeds (Mohammad). Instead of saints like Mother Theresa or
Francis, we get This fat Ayatollah preaching Islams best parts, all below the waist. Thats where Islam resides, below the waist, and around the back. (I could not resist that, sorry, sort of).
Thanks for writing that book RS. Someone needs to get it right...

All religions have differences in terms of what path one should follow but all except Islam teach a path where the journey is part of the faith. It is part of the learning path.

In Islam you can be a wicked person who all sins are forgiven if you wack some non-muslim or blow yourself up. A sort of get out of jail free card.

Life is not always easy but there is a lesson in it. A purpose to this existence. Muslims just want to forget the lesson and short cut their way into paradise. A sort of class room dunce who is cheating off everyone elses faith. That is why Islam looks like a combination one guys paper and then somebody elses. A frankenstein of Christianity, Judiasm, Pagan faiths from Arabia, and throw in a little Zoroastrian/Eastern stuff and you have a true monster. The meaning is lost and it is just one pointless command after the other so you make it to paradise.

Heck even some muslims think allah is above his own rules. What kind of god cheats on his own rules? I just can't accept a god that does that.

Perhaps an equally telling comparison Mr. Spencer would be adding up all the Christian Republics of east Europe who gained freedom from East Germany, Lithuania, Georgia and even Serbia and see how many people died in their revolution.

Then compare Iran, Kosovo, Chechnya, Bosnia and Albania in numbers where Muslims are the lead.

Protestant Lutherans in East Germany held candle vigils, Pope John Paul and his Catholics elsewhere utilized words while in every Islamic cause murder, genocide, kidnapping and crime was their choice.

Wonder what the next book will be. There is a need for someone to give a readable, Reader's Digest version (don't flinch, please) of Bostom's The Legacy of Jihad.

"The kingdom of God is within you."

vs.

"Paradise will have rivers of flowing wine, and virgins for your enjoyment, and young boys like pearls..."

The truly spiritual as opposed to a whorehouse heaven with its perpetual open bar.

The sublime vs. the profane.

Can anyone verify the Evil One's birthday? In Germany there's a thread on the boards that Mahomet shares the same birtdate with Adolf Hitler. It would be nice to know for sure.

This reminds me of a great column by Spengler, juxtaposing Sistani's and Ratzinger's essays on prayer. It demonstrates not the divide between Christian and Muslim thought, but the complete ontological compatibility of the two.
Here are some snippets from the article (and the link):
Ratzinger (and Spengler):

For Sistani, "theology" is an entirely different topic than it is to modern Christians or Jews, for whom theology addresses man's relation to God, and their dialogue in the form of prayer. That is why the experience of prayer is the subject of endless elaboration by Christian and Jewish theologians. Here is the Vatican's chief theologian, Josef Cardinal Ratzinger, in the first chapter of Feast of Faith:

"The basic reason why man can speak with God arises from the fact that God himself is speech, word ... Through the Spirit of Christ, who is the Spirit of God, we can share in the human nature of Jesus Christ; and in sharing in his dialogue with God, we can share in the dialogue with God. This is prayer, which becomes a real exchange between God and man ... Christian prayer is addressed to a God who hears and answers ... Here the gift of God promised unconditionally to those who ask is joy, that 'full' joy which is the expression and the presence of a love which has become 'full'. The reality is the same in each case. Prayer, because of the transformation of being which it involves, means growing more and more into identity with the pneuma of Jesus, the Spirit of God (becoming an "anima ecclesiastica "); borne along by the very breath of his love, we have a joy which cannot be taken from us."

As Ratzinger observes, Christian (as well as Jewish) prayer is a dialogue among lovers. "The soul prayers in the words of the Psalms: let not my prayer and your love depart from me (Psalm 66:20). "It prays to be able to pray - and this is already given to the soul in the assurance of Divine Love," wrote the Jewish theologian Franz Rosenzweig, believing that Jews and Christians are infatuated with God, and prayer is their opportunity to exchange lovers' intimacies. They never tire of talking about talking to their beloved, that is, about the nature of prayer. One might compare Ratzinger's essay to Man in Search of God by Abraham Joshua Heschel, the best-read Jewish theologian of the postwar period.

Sistani:
Sistani's interest in prayer is an entirely different matter. In all the mass of his writings available on the Internet, he has nothing more to say about the content of prayer than the following:

"Prayer is an audience with the Creator, convened at prescribed daily times. Allah has outlined the times at which prayers are said and the manner which they must be conducted. During this audience you be fully absorbed in the experience. You talk to Him and invoke His Mercy. You come out of this encounter with clear conscience and serene heart. It is quite natural that you may feel the presence of Allah while you say your prayer. Above all, prayer is a manifestation of inner feeling that we all belong to Allah, the Most High, who has overall control over everything. And when you utter the phrase, 'Allahu Akbar' at the start of every prayer, all material things should become insignificant because you are in the presence of the Lord of the universe who controls every aspect of it. He is greater than everything. As you recite the chapter of 'al-Fatiha', you say, 'You do we worship, and You do we ask for help'. Thus, you rid yourself of dependency on any mortal. With that exquisite feeling of submission to Him, you enrich your spirit five times a day."

Less important than the differences in content - "audience" rather than "dialogue", "submission" rather than "love" - is the difference in emphasis. With this perfunctory preface, Sistani begins a lengthy treatise on when, where, with what clothing, and in what bodily positions prayers may be said. His concern is not the spiritual experience of prayer, but establishing communal norms for prayer. Where the Christians and Jews gush with loquacity on the subject, Muslims have remarkably little to say about the experience of prayer. Reading through Muslim sources, I am at loss to find anything remotely resembling Ratzinger's quite typical discourse on prayer.

In fact, virtually all of Sistani's writings address communal norms for behavior, including the most intimate. Ritual impurity (janabat) is a central concern, especially in the case of sexual relations. He writes, for example:

"If a person has sexual intercourse with a woman and the male organ enters either of the private parts of the woman up to the point of circumcision or more, both of them enter janabat, regardless of whether they are adults or minors and whether ejaculation takes place or not.

"If a person doubts whether or not his penis penetrated up to the point of circumcision, ghusl [bathing] will not become obligatory on him.

"If (God forbid!) a person has sexual intercourse with an animal and ejaculates, ghusl alone will be sufficient for him, and if he does not ejaculate and he was with wudhu [ritual ablution] at the time of committing the unnatural act, even then ghusl will be sufficient for him. However, if he was not with wudhu at that time, the obligatory precaution is that he should do ghusl and also perform wudhu. And the same orders apply if one commits sodomy.

"If movement of seminal fluid is felt but not emitted, or if a person doubts whether or not semen has been ejaculated, ghusl will not be obligatory upon him...more hilarity is found in the article....read it all...

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/FD16Aa02.html

Oops...that should be "ontological incompatibility."

I would think another key element in comparing Western civilization is noting that the atrocities and crimes committed by Western Civilizations, against each other, against Jews, agianst natives of the Americas and Africans and others, can also be explained in largely the same way that crimes committed by Hindu, Buudhist or any other civilizations can, but nearly as easily for islamic ones.

That is, the simple concept that human civilizations so often wage needless wars, rape women and pillage populations and conquer and steal other lands is the inherent nature of women. Any time atrocities of human civilizations comes up, I often think back to documentaries on behavior of intelligent animals like Chimps or Polphins. Meaning, ther ehave been documentaries on these animals illustrating their propencity to violence outside what is needed for survival; adult male Chimps and other apes have been seen attacking other tribes, staeling young chimps from these tribes and killing them for no reason than out of spite. They've been seen stealing other Chimps' land when it wasn't necessary, and even Dolphins have been reported to attack and assualt others fro no apparent reason. The natural world has forever been based largely on a "kill or be killed" mentality, and animals like Chimps, Doplhins and Humans with higher degrees of intelligenc ehave been long inclined to acts of brutality outside what's needed for survival.

How does this relate to comparing Islamic versus Western civilizations? Because the crimes of western civilizations, the Crusades, the centuries of persecutions of Jews, the displacing of Natives in America and Africa, can be explained by the inherent violent human nature, and this has been acknowledged by Western Civilizations today as they've tried extremely hard to attone for their past crimes and reform their civilizations to address that. Most Westerners, except White Nationalists and other fringe elements, don't take pride in their treatment of Jews, other Christians, their role in the slave trade, or natives of Africa and the Americas. In America, most Whites are not keen to take pride in their treatment of blacks during the 20th century, and the British, French and Italians certainly don't take pride in their treatment of natives of Africa, or try to justify it by saying it was better than Africa is today. They admit there was no excuse for their treatment of Africans in the Congo, South Africa, West Africa or anywhere else.

The Islamic world in contrast continues to prove it is about indulging inherently violent human nature as it continues to deny the realities of dhimmitude and its conquest of the Middle East, North Afric and India. Only they try to justify their colonizations in ways Westerners would be called a fascist for doing, attempting to paint dhimmitude as not all that bad. Given, it is up for endless debate how severe Islamic treatment of Jews, Christians and others was compared to treatment of them by Christian or other civilizations from 1000 to 2000 A.D.

Even if the treatment of Jews under Islam, for example, was often 1,000,000 times better then Jews under Christendom, for instance, then it is still inane that Islamics don't think they have an obligation to attone for and correct the legacy of dhimmitude or other past sins. Moreover, the better, or should I say less awful treatment of jews under islam vs christendom continues to be milked by Islamics to explain how their hatred of Israel results from the Zionists occupation of innocent Arab Palestinians' land and the crimes of the Zionists, not becaus eof the jihadists' need to keep jews subjugated as dhimmis. It the Islamic world had done what Western and other civilizations have done and admitted their material and moral failiures, they could be catching up to the first world in their progress right now.

Final Addenum, to Robert Spencer, if you're still reading after all this, I did have a certian inquiry for you about your book. Why exactly did you choose to name it "Religion of PEace, why Chrisitnaity is-And Islam isnt"? That title does seem to suggest that only Western, "white" civilizations are ideal for comparing to Islamic ones. Why not address the comparision of Hindu, Buudhist, indigenous African or Zoroastrian civilizations as opposed to Islamic ones, instead of just Western civilizations. That way, you would be less likely to alienate readers who might interpret you as suggesting only Western Christians should be actively trying to save their culture from violent jihad, even though longtime JW readers know otherwise. Furthermore, to be honest, Western Civilizations have very frequently indulged in their violent human natures throughout history, hence Islamics will always be able to find some way to justify violent jihad and dhimmitude by suggesting "the West does it too", inane as it often ends up being. By looking at Islamic world relative to Hindu and othe rcivilizations, which have always managed to be more peaceful and respectful, you could drive home the point that Islamic shcolars can no longer justify Islam's history simple by comparing it ot Western indulgences.

Other than that, I do support the majority of what you do at JW and elsewhere

Hi Robert:

Thank-you for your commetary and to you and the staff of JW/DW, a Blessed Happy Easter, this also extends to your dear ones as well.

Just want to leave you with what is chanted in the Latin rite Catholic churches on the vigil service/mass of Easter, a beautiful chant known as the "The Easter Proclaimation, or Exsultet". The beautiful presentation of St. John Chrysostom Easter/Paschal homily, is to me as close to reminding me of the "Exsultet" as one can get. Both are beautiful prayers for this holy night.

The Easter Proclaimation, or Exsultet

"Rejoice, heavenly powers! Sing choirs of angels!
Exult, all creation around God's throne!
Jesus Christ, our King is risen!
Sound the trumpet of salvation!

Rejoice, O earth, in shining splendor,
radiant in the brightness of your King!
Christ has conquered! Glory fills you!
Darkness vanishes for ever!

Rejoice, O Mother Church! Exult in glory!
The risen Savior shines upon you!
Let this place resound with joy,
echoing the mighty song of all God's people!

My dearest friends,
standing with me in this holy light,
join me in asking God for mercy,
that he may give his unworthy minister
grace to sing his Easter praises.

The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give him thanks and praise.
It is truly right that with full hearts and minds and voices
we should praise the unseen God, the all-powerful Father,
and his only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Christ has ransomed us with his blood,
and paid for us the price of Adam's sin to our eternal Father!

This is our passover feast,
When Christ, the true Lamb, is slain,
whose blood consecrates the homes of all believers.

This is the night,
when first you saved our fathers:
you freed the people of Israel from their slav'ry,
and led them dry-shod through the sea.

This is the night,
when the pillar of fire destroyed the darkness of sin.

This is night,
when Christians ev'rywhere,
washed clean of sin and freed from all defilement,
are restored to grace and grow together in holiness.

This is the night,
when Jesus broke the chains of death
and rose triumphant from the grave.

What good would life have been to us,
had Christ not come as our Redeemer?

Father, how wonderful your care for us!
How boundless your merciful love!
To ransom a slave you gave away your Son.

O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!

Most blessed of all nights,
chosen by God to see Christ rising from the dead!

Of this night scripture says:
"The night will be as clear as day:
it will become my light, my joy."

The power of this holy night dispels all evil,
washes guilt away, restores lost innocence,
brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred, brings us peace,
and humbles earthly pride.

Night truly blessed,
when heaven is wedded to earth
and we are reconciled to God!

Therefore, heavenly Father, in the joy of this night,
receive our evening sacrifice of praise,
your Church's solemn offering.

Accept this Easter candle,
a flame divided but undimmed,
a pillar of fire that glows to the honor of God.

Let it mingle with the lights of heaven
and continue bravely burning
to dispel the darkness of this night!

May the Morning Star which never sets
find this flame still burning:
Christ, that Morning Star,
who came back from the dead,
and shed his peaceful light on all mankind,
your Son, who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen."

God Bless you. Peace.

maxwell46&2 said

Why not address the comparision of Hindu, Buudhist, indigenous African or Zoroastrian civilizations as opposed to Islamic ones, instead of just Western civilizations. That way, you would be less likely to alienate readers who might interpret you as suggesting only Western Christians should be actively trying to save their culture from violent jihad

Robert is a Catholic, and is therefore intimately familiar with the teachings of Christianity. A comparison of all the world's religions to Islam would be another book in itself. Of course you are correct that the jihad is targeted against all religions; that is a frequent topic at JW/DW. To my mind, this is one of the most important fundamental points of the jihad: that Thai Buddhists, Indian Hindus, Israeli Jews, European Christians, African Animists (and too many others to list) are all facing the same jihad. We all stand together on this issue.

This atheist sends a heartfelt Happy Easter (I don't mean the Easter Bunny kind, but the Resurrection of Christ kind) to all the Christians out there. Likewise, Happy Pesach to the Jews. The diversity of religious thought and experience throughout the world is a blessing, if one believes in blessings. That is what we are fighting for.

Happy Passover and Easter to all Jihad Watch readers.

To special guest,

You're right that the jihad against all other cultures, indeed even against secularist muslims and muslims whose Islamic beliefs are moderated by their humanity and adherence to pre-islamic cultures is a frequent topic of JW. In that statement I was largely referring to more potentially mainstream readers of Spencer who are less likely to be familiar with his work here.

Happy Easter to the Christians here and a blessed Passover to the Jewish people ! :)

Thank you Robert for posting these articles.

For Robert

Christos Anesti!

Have a happy Easter.

I know that my Redeemer lives, He is Risen! Have a blessed and happy Resurrection Day Robert and all your staff and fans.

The beauty of Christianity:

Romans 8:28

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?

Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

As it is written:

"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

*************

The Easter message!

"The prophet has [had] sword to kill people.

Our [Holy] Imams were quite military men. All of them were warriors. They used to wield swords; they used to kill people. We need a Khalifa [caliph, leader] who would chop hands, cut throat, stone people. In the same way that the messenger of God used to chop hands, cut throats, and stone people. In the same way that he massacred the Jews of Bani Qurayza [a Jewish tribe of Medina, massacred by Muhammad] because they were a bunch of discontent[ed] people. If the Prophet used to order to burn a house or exterminate a tribe that was justice.

The lives of people must be secured through punishment. Because, the protection of the masses lies beneath these very punitive executions. With just a few years of imprisonment things don’t get fixed. You must put aside these childish sentimentalism. We believe that the accused essentially does not have to be tried. He or she must just be killed. Only their identity is to be established and then they should be killed."

Ah yes--the beautiful spirit of the religion of pieces. How fragrant! How rich! How foul!!

Thank G-d Almighty--my Redeemer lives--Jesus Christ, true G-d in the flesh--descended from David, born of a virgin, lived a sinless life to fulfill the law, crucified for our sins according to the scriptures, dead and buried, and gloriously resurrected from the dead on the third day--now ascended into heaven and seated at the right hand of G-d the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. Yes this is what Easter is all about!!

Happy Easter JWers!!

Just one thing: if Muslim treatment of Jews was so much better than Christian, is the datum that I once came across - that by the nineteenth century, nine Jews out of ten lived in the Christian West - false? Or were all Jews masochists?

A blessed Easter to all Christians, and, to all Jews, I hope you have had a wonderful Passover. May the Lord graciously hear all men of goodwill, and reward every good deed done for the sake of goodness and love; for everyone who loves knows God (first letter of John), and everyone who does the best he knows praises the Lord of justice and goodness. "Every time you have done these things to the least among you, you have done them to Me," says the Lord.

I am looking forward to your new book. I think it may be your best one yet and will be so useful when debating the PC morons.

It's a shame you had to write a book about something that is axiomatic, but we live in strange times. Someone should invent a scale to register muslim outrage and liberal hypocrisy. It would be interesting to keep a record of both for future reference. I'm guessing that on a scale of 1-10, the muslim outrage over your new book will be 8. The liberal outrage will probably be 10 because you violated the moral equivalency commandment of the PC multiculti god, and that is simply racist, xenophobic, bigoted, and islamophobic. You would be eligible for the death penalty if they believed in it, and they might make an exception in your case. I will never understand how liberals justify murdering unborn babies, yet weep when criminal monsters are executed. I fully expect that if we remain on our charted course, there will soon be laws that prohibit anti-multiculturalism in any form.

When can orders be placed for your book? I want it the minute it's available.

Definitely looking forward to the new book.

Here's wishing all safe and blessed Passover and Easter celebrations.

Christos anesti ek nekron,
thanato thanaton patisas,
ke tis en tis mnimasin,
zoin charisamenos!

Christ is risen from the dead,
Trampling down death by death,
And to those in the tombs
He has given life!

Joyeuses Pâques à tout le monde!

I just clicked on the link in Robert Spencer's article above and pre-ordered three copies of the new book from Amazon.

I worry a bit about how Robert has framed the coming book, because a lot of people would be more open to reading, say, a comparison between Islam and perhaps two other global religions, such as Hinduism and Christianity. A more "cosmopolitan" project like that would instantly disarm the many predisposed to assume that a book championing Christianity over Islam must be culturally provincial and touting the author's own culture merely because it's his own culture.

I understand teachers cannot always worry about negotiating all the silly prejudices of their readers. On the other hand, that is one of the tasks many teachers mercifully take up: finding rhetorical and pedagogical ways of soothing the savage Cerberus in readers long enough to slip past foolish barking prejudices and teach something.

I'm also concerned that it's a bit easier to convince people Islam is violent and totalitarian than it is to convince people that Christianity is not. Robert Spencer knows a huge amount about Islam, but can he also be such an authority on Christianity and its history? Can't wait to read it.

A happy Passover to all Jews and a happy Easter to all Christians.

Here is a satirical song based on the Qu'ran verses that denigrates Christ's ultimate sacrifice. I mean no offense:

https://www.cruxy.com/info/8679

According to Coleridge, imagination is the prime agent of all human perception and the repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I Am. For Coleridge, the "I Am" to which he referred was the Christ, and was the source of the historical evolution of consciousness, during the course of thousands of years, toward ever increasing individuality among human beings, who anciently began in a kind of collective group soul awareness. Coleridge did not think of Christ or Christianity in opposition to evolution, but on the contrary thought of Christ as THE transforming agent in history and in all evolution.

In the end, one cannot discover this merely from documents. One must also learn to enter the spiritual worlds, the higher worlds, oneself and to strive for ever increasing objectivity about such experiences. I'm talking William James, Schleiermacher, Rudolf Steiner. An objective, open-minded, experiential approach can come closer and closer to the truth about the evolving spiritual worlds, and find the Christ there. Owen Barfield's Unancestral Voice, or perhaps better, his Worlds Apart, is a brilliant fictional-intellectual presentation of what I'm referring to.

Whatever some Christians may have been, Christ is love. Christ is freedom. Happy Easter.

I hope Robert Spencer will find a spot in his new book to compare Christ and Muhammad on the question of "innovation."

Doesn't Christ say that others will come after him who will do greater feats than he did? While Muhammad claims to be the "seal" of the prophets, the last word, and lays heavy threats on innovators?

This could set in bright relief how Christianity is evolutionary, while Islam seeks to end evolution.

And Happy Passover! I'm half-Jewish myself!

People like you are part of the solution

Respect to you - and all of those that listen to your wise words - and respect to all those that "will not submit" - respect to our history, our culture, our feelings and, of course - most of all - respect to those people that respect other person's beliefs, respect to those who respect other people's lives, respect those who respect ..

Otherwise - if I am not respected - if people denigrate my culture, my beliefs, if people do not respect the women of my culture, do not respect the history of my culture, and then fail to evaluate those facts in an honest manner - then I have no respect for them

Without respect for other human beings we are nothing but hate - respect is the key - but some people lack respect for anything other than themselves or their religion

I respect you - but does *the enemy respect you* - I think not - they still think that they are supreme - and that is the problem.

"I have met the enemy and he is mine" - Anon

A fine post, Robert, and an excellent subject for a book.

God bless you and the important work you're doing.

Jesus Christ is arisen today, alleiuia!

A Blessed Happy Easter and a belated Happy Passover to the staff and posters of JW/DW.

Dear Robert,
If you are going to write a book called “A Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't “ you are going to have to answer the question Muslims always give – “but, what about all the violence in the Bible…specifically the Old Testament?”

There are several answers you can give to this.
Firstly, a lot of what is in the old Testament is myth rather than history.
I own several books detailing to what extent the Old Testament is history. One day, er, I shall have to get round to reading them.
Still some people could fill you in on this.
An archaeologist could. Dominic probably could if he was still with us.

Secondly, you will have to explain that although the Old Testament calls for punishments such as stoning for adultery, Jewish people do not take these commandments literally (and to an extent, never have.)

Judaism has evolved a lot over the centuries. You need to explain how and why this happened.
I could try to answer these questions myself. Unfortunately, it would take a lot of time and research, and I am not really able to dedicate myself to this at the moment.

Could some knowledgeable person out there have a go?

I had never heard or read the Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom. It's lovely; thank you.

I look forward to purchasing and reading your next book, Robert Spencer.

Happy Easter to all who celebrate.

"Behold the lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world."

Odysseus: I probably could - but bear in mind that while I am a historian, I am also a Christian, and my account of Jewish history would not be acceptable to about half of JW/DW's readership, since I take the progressive self-revelation of God in Jewish history to be a fact. Still, if anyone is interested I might have a try.

Paolo,

Yes, please do.

You might also try to explain the Passover as recounted in the book of Exodus.
Last night I attended a Catholic service which recounted the killing of every Eygptian First-born.
I have to admit this sounded pretty tough on them - it is not suprising they find it difficult to accept the Judeo-Christian tradition.

I am sure someone could explain the theology of this to me - God loves everyone, even Eygptians.

Odyessus,

The Egyptian firstborn sons were killed by the Angel of Death, not by Moses or the Hebrew slaves.

And... the Egyptians never found "it difficult to accept the Judeo-Christian tradition" at all. In fact, Egypt was the first nation in the Roman Empire to become majority Christian (as early as the second century BCE).

Many of the greatest of the early Church Fathers were Egyptian: Athanasius, Origen, Cyril of Alexandria, etc. It was in Egypt that Saint Anthony codified the monastic tradition and Saint Mary of Egypt is one of the most beloved saints of Eastern Christendom.

Even before the rise of Christianity, Egypt was attracted to Judaic culture. After the destruction of the First Temple, a central site of Judaism was established at Elephantine. After Alexander the Great founded Alexandria, that city soon had largest Jewish community in the world and its great synagogue was, at one time, the world's largest religious building. It was in Egypt that the Septuagent Bible was codified.

Even today, the direct descendants of the original Egyptians are the Coptic Christians, not their Arab Muslim conquerers. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point.

Anyway, to all my fellow Christians:
Christos Aneste (Christ is Risen!)
Alethos Aneste (He is Truly Risen!)

And to my Jewish relatives and friends: Best wishes for a Chag Kasher V'sameach - a happy Pesach!

POPE BENEDICT: A GOD/ALLAH OF REASON OR AN IRRATIONAL EVIL GOD/ALLAH

UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF RELIGIOUS RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS

An ISLAMIC REVOLUTION

There is a danger to democratic societies of political correctness toward Islam. Violence committed in the name of Islam and the inequality of Muslim woman can never be accepted by democratic societies. There are many moderate Muslims who are risking their lives to reform Islam. These moderate Muslims are engaged with the Islamic fundamentalists in a life and death struggle for the heart and soul of Islam. We need to form an alliance with moderate Muslims in their historical struggle to dramatically reduce recruits for terrorism.

Such an alliance will lead to a Reformation of Islam. The Equality of Women and the Renunciation of Religious Violence are essential cornerstones in the Reformation of Islam. There can be no polite political correctness here. Tolerating - intolerance is no longer an option.

Islamic Fundamentalists have taken Islam and turned its teachings into a murderous medieval ideology – that the killing of infidels in the name of Allah will be rewarded in heaven - allowing the Islamists to sexually molest for all eternality 72 virgins, in 72 mansions, and 72 beds – that the murder of millions of non - believers is a religious duty, women are inferior to men - their virtual slaves to be denied education, beaten, killed for adultery or other sexual transgressions (real or imaged), covered from head to toe, people can be butchered, mutilated and tortured, barbers giving hair cuts killed, music and movies banned, women practicing folk dancing murdered, teachers murdered, schools teaching young girls blown up, anyone who believes in a different interpretation of Islam to be killed and on and on. Muslims have paid a terrible price at the hands of these Fundamentalists. Children massacred. Grand parents brains scattered all over the street. Men, women, children, old and young. Over one hundred and fifty thousand Muslims have been slaughtered in the most horrid, grotesque, unimaginable ways since 9/11.

Against these ridiculous crazy teachings, the Western World is intellectually collapsing – freedom of speech is collapsing. Anyone who writes or puts on a play exposing these teachings can be killed. In the face of this onslaught, moderate Muslims are being pushed to the background and running for cover. Western Governments are running for cover. Mosques are being taken over by radical Islamists from the Saudi Arabian Wahhabbi sect.

There is a disaster that awaits the world’s nations if religious extremism is not defeated. The fact that people believe that they will go to Heaven as a reward for mass murder is truly frightening. It’s just a matter of time before one of these religious maniacs straps a nuclear weapon on their back and blows up an entire city.

The Pope in his recent speech on God and Reason has shown the way forward. A very important event occurred recently when 36 Islamic Scholars sent the Pope a communication in which they agreed – that in Islam, Allah is – “A GOD OF REASON.” This important declaration - perhaps one of the most important by a group of such eminent Islamic scholars must be seized upon. The Pope should call for a world religious conference on the scale of Vatican 2 bringing together all the top religious leaders and scholars from EVERY world religion to draft a DECLARATION OF UNIVERSAL RELIGIOUS RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS. This Declaration will form the basis of an historic alliance between Christianity and Islam to turn the murderous fundamentalist tide before it is too late. Again - before a nuclear weapon is exploded in the Name of Allah in a Western City killing millions.

Following would be the format of this Universal Religious Declaration.

DECLARATION OF UNIVERSAL RELIGIOUS RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS

There is only one God
God is God
God is a God of Reason.
God is not an irrational being. If God is irrational then God is not God.

Ordinary people on the street understand the words – “reason” and ‘irrational”. Any such declaration must be kept simple - not an intellectual rambling on of the Philosophy of Reason. (For a very important article on the Philosophy of Reason and Pope Benedicts controversial speech I draw your attention to article – “Socrates or Muhammad?
Joseph Ratzinger on the destiny of reason” by Lee Harris.)

God Being a God of Reason Therefore:

All violence in the Name of God/Allah is the GREATEST evil anyone can commit. Suicide is an evil act in every religion. Suicide bombers killing themselves and others in the Name of God/Allah – this is the Supreme evil act. The second most evil act is killing, maiming, and torturing others to the Greater Glory of God/Allah. The evil concept of Jihad as religious holy war must be condemned. It must be declared that all references to violence in any holy book/text are not the word of God/Allah but the word of man. No God/Allah who is God/Allah would ever instruct anyone to commit acts of violence against any other human being. Violence in religion must be totally and completely renounced – WITHOUT EQUIVOCATION. There is no heaven for these murderers. No mansions. No virgins. Just the black hole of eternal damnation. You cannot climb to heaven on the corpses of the murdered. If God /Allah believes in violence then God/Allah is irrational and therefore God/Allah is not God/Allah but the incarnation of evil.

God Being A God of Reason Therefore:

Women and men are equal in the eyes of God/Allah. Women are the equal of men. Women are not valued by God/Allah as worth 50% of men. God/Allah did not create women to be the chattel or slaves of men. Females have full rights in society before the law, under the rule of law, can dress any way they freely desire without fear of death, walk the streets without a male relative escort, do any occupation, have the right to vote, the full right to participate in the governance of any society, be the leader or member of government of any country, receive all educational rights, drive planes, trains, automobiles, fly to the stars, choose their own husbands etc. No man whether husband, father, brother, relative, boyfriend, or stranger has the right to beat or mistreat a woman. Men who beat women are the lowest of the low. These equal rights of women in society are very important. Their exercise without fear of violence - without the fear of being victims of Honor Killings must be declared WITHOUT EQUIVOCATION in any such declaration. All references to the inferiority of women in any holy book/text are not the word of God/Allah but the word of man. If God/Allah is a sexist then God/Allah is irrational and therefore God/Allah is not God/Allah.

God Being A God of Reason Therefore:

There are many ways to God/Allah. Each individual has the total and complete right to find his/her own way to God/Allah or not. Religious freedom is the right of all mankind. The right to build churches, mosques etc. To practice ones religious beliefs non – violently is a corner stone of all civilized societies. The right to change ones religion without fear of death. The right to freely preach and practice one’s religion in any country. Only an irrational God/Allah would order people put to death for not believing in religion or deciding to change ones beliefs from one religion to another religion. Religious freedom is an unimpeachable right. It must be declared WITHOUT EQUIVOCATION.

God Being A God Of Reason Therefore:

All human beings are created equal. All races are created equal. God/Allah does not wish that any human being be a slave. No one person is the lesser of the other. All human beings (no matter of their race, color, creed, ethnic origins) have the full right to protection of their human rights and human dignity. To use religion to spread hate against other races, religions in places of worship, employing television or any other medium, teaching hatred to the young in schools – this is evil incarnate. If God/Allah is a racist then God/Allah is irrational and therefore God/Allah is not God/Allah.

God Being A God Of Reason Therefore

God/Allah blessed man with an intelligence to reason, to explore, to seek the truth of any question – total freedom of thought. To think and reason without fear of jail/death. It is against the will of God/Allah to threaten anyone with death, torture or prison for freely exercising his God/Allah given brain. The human brain is the greatest gift God/Allah has ever bestowed on man. It was given to mankind to purse - the arts, literature, sciences, intellectual pursuits. Its free exercise is the will of God/Allah. Declared WITHOUT EQUIVOCATION. If God/Allah is anti intellectual then God/Allah is irrational and therefore God/Allah is not God/Allah.

God Being A God Of Reason Therefore

All mankind has the right to freedom and democracy, equality before the law, freedom of action, freedom of thought, right to elect their leaders. God /Allah does not want dictators and tyrants to rule over other men. NO EQUIVOCATION. If God/Allah does not believe in the right of mankind to Freedom and Democracy then God/Allah is irrational and therefore God/Allah is not God/Allah.

Pope Benedict has opened the way to a great reconciliation of the world religions. A Grand Conference issuing this Universal Declaration of Religious Rights and Freedoms to be read in every Church, Synagogue, and Mosque – to be taught in every school - would be the start of an alliance between faiths against ALL religious extremists. A turning point in the struggle for the minds of young people especially young Muslims who are being constantly bombarded by a religious evil ideology.

Intolerance can never be tolerated in a free and democratic society. Those who refuse to accept Western democratic rights and freedoms, the teachings of a God of Reason, must be cased out into the darkness. Those Islamic Clerics who refuse to sign this Declaration must be kicked out of their Mosques and denied membership in the World Counsel of Religions.

Written By

Larry Houle
E-mail: intermedusa@yahoo.com
www.godofreason.com

Larry,
I wish I shared your faith in great religious conferences. Unfortunately I don't.

To shed more light on John Chrysostom whom Robert has just quoted, Below are the excerpts from Chrysostom's homilies Against the Jews (the title illuminates the content rather well). Chrysostom condemned those Chrystians who followed Jewish customs and attended the synagogue on Jewish festivals and in so doing he maligned the Jews so viciously that for the next 17 centuries antisemites would draw upon him for inspiration:

Another very serious illness bids me to speak in order to cure it, an illness which has sprung up in the body of the church. First we must root it out, then take thought for matters outside; first we must cure our own people, and then concern ourselves with those who aren’t our own people. What’s this disease? The festivals of the wretched and miserable Jews are about to approach thick and fast: the Trumpets, the Tabernacles, the Fasts. Of the many in our ranks who go to watch the festivals, who say they think as we do, some will both join in the festivities and take part in the Fasts. This bad habit I want to drive out of the church right now.

It was to the Canaanite woman that Christ was speaking when he called the Jews children and the Gentiles dogs. But see how after that the order was reversed: the Jews became dogs, and we became children.

Such animals, when they’re unfit for work, become fit for the slaughter. It was this fate, then, that the Jews suffered: in making themselves useless for work, they became fit for the slaughter.

But the Jews will no doubt say that they too worship God. Heaven forbid them to say that! No Jew worships God.Who says so? The Son of God. ‘If you knew my Father’, he says, ‘you 30 would know me too. But you neither know me nor do you know my Father’ (John 8:19). What sort of evidence can I produce that’s more trustworthy than that? If, then, the Jews don’t recognise the Father, if they crucified the Son, if they repulsed the help of the Spirit, who wouldn’t be bold enough to declare that (the synagogue) is the resting-place of demons? God isn’t worshipped there. Heaven forbid! Therefore it’s the place of idolatry.

The Jews frighten you as if you were small children, and you don’t realise it. It’s like when many nasty slaves show frightening and ridiculous masks to children (they’re not frightening in themselves, but appear so because of the simple minds 13 of the children), and arouse a great deal of laughter. In exactly the same way the Jews scare the more simple-minded Christians, for how could (their synagogues) be frightening, when they’re full of great shame and ridicule—(the synagogues) of people who have rebelled, been dishonoured and condemned?

Therefore avoid both their gatherings and their places, and let nobody venerate the synagogue because of its books, but let them hate and turn their back on it because the Jews maltreat the holy ones, because they refuse to believe their own words, because they accuse them of the ultimate impiety.

[T]he impiety of the Jews and the pagans is equal, but the deceit practised by the Jews is more difficult to deal with: indeed, in their synagogue there stands an invisible altar of deceit, on which they sacrifice not sheep and calves but the souls of human beings

[D]emons live in the synagogue, not only in the place itself but also in the very souls of the Jews.

What attribute of theirs would be the first to strike us with astonishment—their impiety or their cruelty or their inhumanity? The fact that they sacrificed their sons, or that they sacrificed them to demons?

This is your Judeo-Christian civilization. Enjoy it.

Liggett said:

This is your Judeo-Christian civilization. Enjoy it.

Your quote of John Chrysostom is interesting and revealing, and suggests that Robert Spencer may have made a mistake in above quoting one of Chrysostom's benign statements. But your saying, "This is your Judeo-Christian civilization, enjoy it" makes as much sense as pointing at a rotten apple and saying, "Here is what an apple is, enjoy it."

But then maybe your intent was baldly to assert that Judeo-Christian civilization is all or mostly bad. Good luck with that belief.

Odyessus and Paolo -
The question about violence in other religions compared with violence in Islam is answered, brilliantly, in a new article at here. The article fleshes out and illuminates a number of answers Robert Spencer has given on this question, and adds brilliant new insights.

Liggett:

Thanks. I was expecting someone to get around to that. You'll note that I didn't say John Chrysostom was a paradigm of Christian thought in all things, or an exemplar in every way. I just posted his one sermon. I'll be discussing his attacks on the Jews in my new book, and condemning antisemitism in no uncertain terms, in the context of statements contradicting his made by Christian leaders throughout the ages, and a call for Christians and Jews to work together against the jihad.

Cordially
Robert Spencer

Liggett's quotation of the dark side of John Chrysostom, a side Robert Spencer seems not to have known, would appear to reinforce a concern I have about Robert Spencer's coming new book. Is Robert Spencer as much an expert on the whole history of Christianity and Christian theology as he is on Islam? And if not, doesn't his coming book risk making mistakes that could undeservedly damage his reputation for huge expertise on Islam?

If the book is ready, and Robert Spencer knows exactly what he is doing with it, wonderful, but if there is any doubt, I hope Spencer will first have the book vetted by a range of Christian theologians and historians so that attacks like Liggett's above can be anticipated and avoided. Christian history is a huge subject and it would be remarkable if one man could be a brilliant and preeminent expert not only on Islam but also on Christianity.

Liggett:
Dante, Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Leonardo, Ludwig van Beethoven and Giuseppe Verdi were Catholic.
Johann Sebastian Bach, William Wilberforce, Charles Dickens and Martin Luther King were Protestant.
Lev Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Pyotr Tchaikovsky were Orthodox.
Moses Maimonides, Alfred Einstein, and Jack Kirby were Jewish.
That is to mention a few.

This is the Judeo-Christian civilization you wish to opt out of. You are welcome to a life without beauty, wisdom, music, and nobility of spirit and mind - lit only by the fitful fires of your ignorant, self-centred fanity.

Oops. While I was composing my last comment, and right before I posted it, Robert Spencer posted a comment addressing my concern! As Emmy Lou Latella would say, "never mind!"

er, vanity. However - to complete my message - you do not have the right to cherry-pick features of Judeo-Christian civilization that please you after cursing it root and branch. I do not doubt that you would, being vain and self-centred, but you still would be acting as a vampire stealing a life that does not belong to you.

Paolo,
Nice response to Mr. Liggett, or so I think.

Paolo, I mean the response mentioning Einstein and Michelangelo and the rest.

Paolo - a few pedantic corrections to your list of Judeo-Christians:

Shakespeare was not a Catholic (he was C of E).
Tolstoy was excommunicated from the Orthodix church.
Einstein was an atheist.

And for many of the people you mention, their achievements were secular had little to do with religion, and their religions were abstract labels foisted upon them in childhood.

Robert wrote:
"Western civilization, rooted as it is in Christianity..."

What distinguishes Western civilisation is secularism, not Christianity.

When Christianity reigned supreme (i.e. in the middle-ages), the West was rather similar in its barbarism to the present day Islamic world.

From a posting above
“When Christianity reigned supreme (i.e. in the middle-ages), the West was rather similar in its barbarism to the present day Islamic world.”

Is that true? Someone like Hilaire Belloc regarded the 13 th Century as the pinnacle of Western Civilization.
And in terms of it’s architecture and scholarship that is quite possibly true.
Not all the scholarship was theological – watch “Medieval Lives” by Terry Jones of Monty Python fame.
In terms of it’s architecture, it is doubtful whether buildings like the Sainte-Chappelle or Chatres Cathedral have ever been surpassed. They are like the sculpture from the Parthenon – a standard valid for all time.
And the Renaissance? Well Frank Lloyd Wright described it as “ a sunset all Europe mistook for dawn.”

It's threads of comments like these that make me love JW.
As for comparative religion I have had a few thoughts since studying Islam.
The concept of martyrdom for the Christian is firmness in witness to one's beliefs - even unto death. For Islamicists, the opposite trait (Taqqyeh)is invoked as a reason to disown one's faith in order NOT to have to witness to it.
In Islam the concept of martyrdom involves willingness to die as part of the process of taking out as many infidels as possible.
Some forms of Christianity seem to me to concentrate a lot on sexual matters - in the way of seeking to curb human passion, vice, sin, etc. While Islam is preoccupied with sexual matters in a lascivious and indulgent way.
Other religions besides Christianity have accompanied the building up of great civilizations, as in the Far East and in India and pre-Columbian Americas. Western Civilization (Judaeo-Christian, if you will) seems to me to have been characterized by openness to learning from others.
And I agree with Belloc regarding the Middle Ages. Sublime beauty and magnificent learning FLOURISHED during those centuries.
And as for the stars of Western civilization being stuck with Tags of Christian identity - that is a red herring. They existed, studied, developed and flourished in the context of Western Civilization.
Even the dreaded Inquisition - often "mentioned" by the enemies of Catholicism -if studied objectively turns out to have been one of the least severe court systems in its time. Perhaps a sad aspect of our times - living in the age of PC nonsense, is that we have allowed ourselves to accept the lies told about us, and to have them taught in our schools.
As for St. John Chrysostom - he is a saint of the universal Church, primarily because of his brilliant speaking ability and his willingness to stand up to the political bullies of his time. One of the beauties of sainthood (in Orthodoxy and Catholicism) is that it in no way infers the infallibility of the particular saint. They are not gods. They are sinful and imperfect human beings.
Well, there's my 2 cents' worth.
A happy Pascha, Pesach, Easter to all.

PS Have enjoyed the many television programs (particularly on FOX News)these last couple of days highlighting the beautiful message of Our Lord. Even the MSM has had excellent coverage of the Paschal celebrations around the world, particularly in the Holy Land and in Rome.
To do similar programs on Islam would be too gory (if the producers permitted truthfulness)and a list of its achievements in civilization would not amount to a few moments of airtime, methinks.

“When Christianity reigned supreme (i.e. in the middle-ages), the West was rather similar in its barbarism to the present day Islamic world.”

I have to say, this strikes me as a rather simplistic view of the period... whilst it is true that there were periods when some parts of europe were pretty nasty places to live, the general trend was one of progressive enlightenment and advancement, culturally, spiritually and technologically.

I agree that wester civilisation is built on secularism, but you seem to neglect that it's christianity that allowed that secularism to exist in the first place. Christ stated "render unto ceasar that which is ceasar's, and render unto God that which is God's", deliniating and acknolwedging the seperation between the temporal and spiritual government. There is no such command or concept in any other world religion, as far as I know. Certainly not in Islam. Therefore it's a mistake to claim that western secularism is separate from the judeo-christian heritage. It wouldn't exist without it.

Robert, thank you! The contrast speaks for itself - you could almost simplify your coming book by just printing the two speeches on facing pages over and over.

I've been reading jihadwatch and dhimmiwatch, and learning from them, for over a year, but it took Golden-Mouthed John to move me to register. What a wonderful homily to read on this holy day. Thank you again.

Archonix:
I agree with the point you make to Schmegel: The separation of religion and state is rooted in various actions and statements of Jesus in the Bible. ("My Kingdom is not of this world," for example. You mention the "Give to Caesar" statement. There are a number of other New Testament statements directly relevant to this theme of separating spiritual and temporal powers.)

Thus the historical Enlightenment, with its celebration of liberty and reason, is in many ways a fruit of the New Testament, even if some Christians resisted the Enlightenment. Also, don't historians now argue that the "Dark Ages" were not nearly so dark as had been thought thirty years ago? Or we could consider How the Irish Saved Civilization, that excellent historical work that shows how Irish Christian monks were essential to the preservation of civilization during the fall of the Roman Empire.

In many respects, Christianity gave birth to the society that gave birth to Einstein and the others, even if Einstein was not an avowed Christian. Schmegel might say no, it wasn't Christianity that gave birth to the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution and so on, it was our heritage from the ancient Greeks and Romans. But even if that's more than a half-truth, and I don't think it is, doesn't it say something significant about Christendom that it merged with ancient Greek culture in the ways it did? Consider how intimately Aquinas absorbed Aristotle, for example, and how important Aquinas was to medieval Christianity.

Interesting to note too the difference between Aquinas and the famous medieval Muslim philosopher Averroes. For Averroes human individuality was not inherent but a mere result of the bodily container confining some sort of universal spirit, so that when the bodily container died, the individual dissolved into a World-All, and one could not speak of individual immortality. The individual had been no more a real being with its own boundaries than is water held in a cup when the cup is broken. The water eventually merges absolutely indistinguishably with the ocean. Aquinas, on the other hand, affirmed the inherent reality of individuality, thus did not agree that individuality was merely an effect of something external, namely the bodily container, and thus affirmed the continued existence of individuality beyond the body, i.e., after death.

Even if you don't believe in life after death, notice the essential point: Aquinas, the Christian, insists on the inherent reality of the individual soul, while Averroes affirms the opposite. Aquinas' belief in the reality of the individual is rooted in the New Testament's remarkably egalitarian emphasis on love for every person, since each one has God, the Kingdom of Heaven, within. Everyone, even a slave, can become a son or daughter of God. That emphasis on the sacredness of each individual eventually gives birth to the freedoms of modern, secular, society -- though not necessarily to all the negative aspects of those freedoms.

Further, Christianity brought from Judaism to the world an experience of time as linear, which means a kind of time is individualized. With cyclical concepts of time, by contrast, such as existed everywhere more or less regnant among all other worldviews at that time, everything is ultimately just a repetition of an eternal pattern of one kind or another (compare Plato, for example). If one is essentially a repetition of something, that precludes being a fully unique individual identity. But Christianity universalized the sense of linear history apparently first discovered by the Jews. Linear time is open-ended and allows for a concept of progress, as well as for personal histories that are not mere repetitions of eternal patterns. This is another source of modern secular society with its freedoms.

Schmegel: if your level of knowledge is your justification to talk about these things, shut up. Everyone who studied the documents knows that Shakespeare's father and daughter were Catholic, and that his whole work is full of Catholic ideas and characters. He even contributed to an anonymous piece that treats Thomas More as a hero. Of course he was a Catholic - a hidden one, in a time when to be openly Catholic in England was to meet a peculiarly nasty death. Tolstoy was excommunicated, but he was an unmistakeable Christian heretic. And Einstein must have been the only atheist in history to say that "God does not play dice with the universe" and that "refiniert ist der Herr Gott, aber boshaftig ist Er nicht" - "the Lord God is subtle, but malicious he is not" - with the complimentary word Herr added in like a gesture of genuflection; and who annoyed so much a colleague (Niels Bohr) that he told him to stop talking as if he understood God. Some atheist! Buck up your ideas, mate, and crack a book every now and then.

Paolo -

Interesting point about Shakespeare. But doesn't the fact that Catholics in England at the time had to keep their faith secret for fear of being burnt to death by Protestants indicate precisely the kind of religiously inspired barbarism to which my previous posting referred.

Einstein and other physicists use a pantheistic 'God' metaphor to refer to the infinitely complex, awe inspiring workings of the universe. This is not the personal God of Judeo-Christian (or Islamic) religion at all. The religious God is a conscious being who makes decisions and passes judgement. The 'God, or nature' of Spinoza, which is the 'God' referred to by Einstein, is explicitly not such a being. Einstein himself dissociated his statements from any belief in a personal (i.e. conscious, thinking, judging) God.

This is your Judeo-Christian civilization. Enjoy it.

Posted by: Liggett at April 8, 2007 03:22 PM

Can you suggest a superior alternative, Mr. Liggett? One ancient, anti-Semitic screed hardly exemplifies an entire civilization.

Schmegel, secularism is a product of Judeo/Christian civilization. Everybody knows that except maybe militant atheists, who blame war, slavery, racism, injustice, and the rest of humanity's fallibilities and cruelties on Christianity. Where did Stalin, Hitler, Lenin, and Pol Pot find their inspiration to commit unspeakable evil on an unprecedented scale? Certainly not from Christianity or Judaism, which they rejected, denounced, feared, and attempted to purge from their populations in order to totally control them. God complexes are not inculcated by the teachings of Judaism and Christianity, nor are evil and malevolence.

Larry, allah is not and will never be a god of reason; he is not even a god. The Qur'an is the immutable word of allah and cannot be changed, reformed, or altered in any way. Islam cannot be reformed and inter-faith dialogue with muslims is an exercise in futility. They believe they are superior to non-muslims, that islam is the only acceptable religion, and they will lie, deceive, and manipulate until they think they have the upper hand. There is only one way to co-exist with muslims and that is to be separated from them by at least five thousand miles. Islam is entirely incompatible with every aspect of American culture, government, and religious beliefs. Muslims and Americans share absolutely none of the same values; muslim values are antithetical to the values of the rest of humanity whether they be Christian, Jewish, Hindu, secular, atheist.

I certainly respect and appreciate your good intentions but you're wasting your time. I do hope you will not fall prey to the deceptive practices of muslim con artists. They're so convincing and sincere while lying through their teeth and silently despising you because you're a kafir.

traeh -

However great a philospher Aquinas was, his opinions regarding 'heresy' demonstrate the barbarism of the time.

He said that a heretic (i.e. anyone who is deemed to have deviated from official Church doctrine) should first be given the chance to change his opinions. If he refuses to change his opinions, he must be killed (burnt at the stake).

Charming! And this Aquinas guy was supposed to be a 'saint'!

Odyessus - I entirely agree with you that the Gothic cathedrals of the late Middle-Ages are the highest achievements in the history of architecture. However, high quality architecture does not preclude the barbaric treatment of human beings.

schmegel, you really are missing the point. Yes, the behaviour of protestants and catholics toward each other was pretty much the worst sort of behaviour you can imagine, but it was not inspired by scripture. It was often claimed to be inspired by scripture but the truth of the matter is that all those burnings, hangings and general mistreatment of the "other" were entirely humanly inspired. Jesus said let he who is without sin cast the first stone, removing the concept of capital punishment for religious transgressions - i.e not things like murder, which were dealt with seperately - from Christianity in a single stroke. It simply took us humans a long time to catch up with the concept.

There was not, and is not, any scriptural justification for the use of death as a punishment for transgressions against religious concepts. However, the fact that people have made mistakes in this regard does not invalidate their entire body of work Aquinas is one of those responsible for preserving and expanding the discussion of the concept of the id, the inner self, freedom of thought and individuality. Do we reject all of these arguments because they were made by a man who then went on to argue that heretics should be punished?

I'd also take issue with your description of allah as a "personal" god. If any god was less personal then he, I can't think of one.

Schmegel: bullshit. Your pathetic assertion that all physicists are pantheists or atheists reflects nothing but personal prejudice, and your application of it to Einstein is contradicted by the very words I quoted, which speak of actions and attitudes of a personal God, who in Einstein's views does not set His creation at random ("does not play dice with the universe") and who has a definite attitude to revealing Himself - the same which Heraklitos found in Apollo: "The Lord whose house is in Delphi neither states nor conceals, but hints." "Refiniert", in German, is the word for someone who gets results by indirect means, by hints and subtle directions, and it definitely refers to a personal attitude - you never speak except of a "refinierte Person", and, in spite of the German language's love for abstraction, I for one never came across anything like "das Refiniert". If you are so obstinately wedded to your definition of a scientist as not to be able to read what is there on the page, then you are a dangerous fanatic. You are simply saying that anyone who believes in a personal God does not meet your definition of a scientist.

As for your nonsense about Aquinas, I will not even trouble answering you: only to ask the rest of the readership here whether a man who deliberately refuses to understand what was said in a living language by a well-known figure within a few decades of his own time is competent to judge anything about someone who lived seven centuries earlier and wrote in a highly specialist version of a dead language. Let alone the matter of this person's proven fanaticism.

To traeh, Paolo et al

The "Judeo-Christian civilization" is a recent invention describing a recent and extremely fragile reality. The last 2 thousand years of Jewish-Christian interaction were 2 thousand years of antisemitism. John Chrysostom was not merely an ancient lunatic: he is one of the most respected Fathers of the Church and at the same time, one of the Founding Fathers of Christian antisemitism. He was at the roots of the tradition that would later depcit Jews as killers of God, sons of the devil, murderers of Christian children. Countless Jews would give their lives during countless pogroms throughout the Christian world and those lucky one who would survive would live in humiliation and oppression. Like it or not, but until very recently views of Chrysostom were representative of the views of the Christian church at large: it was only 40 years ago that the Catholic church repudiated the idea of deicidal Jews. Nor was Chrysostom, for all his virulence, the most rabid antisemite in the history of Christianity: Martin Luther said much worse things about Jews. Those who live in the U.S. nowadays may be tempted to think that the Judeo-Christian civlization of modern America is the natural order of things. It isn't, or at least it wasn't for the last 2 thousand years.

Schmegel,

You argue that since Thomas Aquinas thought the death penalty could be justified against heretics against the Christian faith then must be worthless?
I am not sure I would agree.

Heresy can do enormous damage and so the idea of draconian punishments against heretics must be weighed with this in mind before coming to any conclusions.

Islam was and is from the Christian point of view heresy. That is why Belloc wrote about “The Great and Enduring Heresy of Mohammed.”

Islamic invasions are estimated to have killed 80 million people in India and 60 million people in the formely, entirely Christian Mediterranean.

This must be borne in mind when considering the determination of churchmen to stamp out heresy before it got too powerful. Even from the point of view of simply saving human lives, you can make a strong argument that the draconian approach was justified because, if you valued human life, this approach would actually save lives in the long run.

To take an analogy from modern history.
At the end of the Second World War Japan remained undefeated.
Strategic plans were drawn up for the land invasion of Japan.
The sort of level of casualties they were estimating were as follows: Allied casualties between 1-3 million, Japanese casualties 10 million upwards, a high proportion of them civilians.
The alternative was drop the atomic bomb. Even Eisenhower was appalled at the thought of using this weapon but they did and it did end the war.

A similarly ruthless approach to Christian heresy might actually save lives in the long wrong. So it seemed to Thomas Aquinas.

At any rate Aquinas was far LESS ruthless than someone like Eisenhower or Harry Truman.

Liggett: while I have to keep reminding myself that it is not my task to educate every self-important, hate-ridden ignoramus on the Net, I have at least to inform you that to bracket John Chrisostomos and Martin Luther together shows total ignorance. The only thing you know about history and religion is the names of people who have been rude about Jews, and the things they said about Jews. You probably think Hitler was a Christian, too.

Odysseus: stop wasting your precious time arguing with Schmegel. He and Liggett are both beyond debate; they live their lives in blinkered categories defined by hatred, and if they are on this site at all, it is only because they hate Islam nearly as much as they hate Christianity.

"Those who live in the U.S. nowadays may be tempted to think that the Judeo-Christian civlization of modern America is the natural order of things. It isn't, or at least it wasn't for the last 2 thousand years."

...America is only about 250 years old...

Ligget,

You are citing a spurious source. It is true that some modern readers have claimed that, based on a reading of St. John's Orations "Against the Judaizers" that the saint was an Anti-Semite. Indeed, a glance over these writings, such as the poor translation you quote above, could lead one to believe as such. Many Anti-Semitic groups throughout history have certainly tried to justify their beliefs and actions by using the writings of St. John.

What is unfortunate is that this misuse of the saint's words is based significantly on a mistranslation of the title of the sermons, translated as "Against the Jews" rather than "Against the Judaizers" which is the rendering the most up to date translations are now using. By this adjustment, sermons intended by the saint to be polemics against those in 4th century Antioch who would try to Judaize the Christians are being read as racist invective. Chrysostom's bombastic rhetoric may offensive to modern ears, he's not coming down on Judaism. He's primarily rebuking Judaizing Christians who attend Synagogue on Saturday and Church on Sunday, still trying to live in both worlds, and who teach others to do the same

The Golden-Mouthed saint did not hate Jews, but in many other sermons is "quite admiring of the local Jewish community and their religious devotion and stamina" and his polemics against the Judeo-Christians were shared by most Rabbis who saw this syncretism as a threat to the integrity of both Judaism and Christianity. The Polemics of the Rabbis is equally harsh against those Jews who wanted to mix in Christianity, but it would be a slander to call them anti-Christian bigots just as it is a slander to label Chrisostom an ant-Semite.

Paolo,

I do not respond to petty insults.

Provoslavni,

"Against Judaizers" is a modern invention by some apologetically-minded patristics scholars. The traditional title of the sermons is "Against the Jews" ("Kata Ioudaion" in Greek). The source from I quoted is far from spurious: it is a scholarly biography of Chrysostom by Wendy Mayer and Pauline Allen published in 2000 by Routledge. You may wish to think Chrysostom's antisemitic statements are an artefact of poor translation; they aren't.

The rest of your arguments is beside the point. Chrysostom's antisemitic invective may not have been racist; but it was antisemitic nonetheless. Racial antisemitism is a recent phenomenon that emerged only in the 19th century. Antisemitism is more than 2 thousand years older, and in the Christian world it was mostly religious rather than racial: Christians believed that as soon as Jews converted they stopped being Christ-killers and servants of the devil. Rabbis were justifiably harsh on those Jews who believed Jesus was a messiah, but what does this have to do with John Chrysostom? You're arguing that Chrysostom had nothing against Jews; he only called them "dogs" and "fit for the slaughter". I leave it up to the readers of the thead to decide whether any rational person can be convinced by this argument.

Another thread I would like to take up.

We sometimes hear asserted by the posters at JW the following:
Western Civilization is not based on the Judeo-Christian heritage.
It is based on Classical Civilization – Greco-Roman Civilization.

A few thoughts on this:

Classical civilization was, it would seem to me, in deep trouble, in decline really before the rise of Christianity.

I am not a professional Classical historian but I can recount the impressions I have garnered from reading, travels etc. Any more informed individual is welcome to take up this thread.

Perhaps the most important figure in Roman history, THE pivotal figure, is Julius Caesar. He transformed the Roman Republic in to the Roman Empire.
Caesar regarded himself as the ablest leader in Rome. There is also no doubt that he was motivated by personal ambition. In order to gain the position of authority he felt he deserved as was qualified for, he lead his legions across the Rubicon, sparking civil war in 49 BC.
Lest, anyone question his qualifications to lead Rome, he argued that his assination, if it happened, would be followed by even greater unrest.
His influence his felt even today. In 45 B.C. he consulted various astromoners and concluded there were 365 and a ¼ days in a year. The Julian Calendar is used still today.
He was also a deeply ruthless individual. His invasion of Gaul (France) resulted in the deaths of 700,000 people.
In 44 B.C. he was assinated. His death did not mark a return to a Republic. Instead there was a series of civil wars even worse than the one which preceded his assent to power. His prediction proved correct.

When Rome shifted from being a Republic to a sort of of monarchy, it was not a monarchy as, say, the Brits would understand it.

The Senate deified Augustus after he died. The Emperors were considered to be gods.
Then there was Caligula, the first emporer who wanted to be declaired to be a god in his own lifetime (this was considered by the Romans to be perhaps his worst outrage.)

Not only did the Emperors consider themselves gods, they persecuted Christianity.
I quote from memory but a good example of this would be Diocletian.
He instituted a policy of killing any Jews descended from King David. Why did he do this? Well he obviously felt threatened by the new religious movement. But why? He feared that it was some sort of Nationalist/military movement. A movement centered around Jesus who was, after all, “of David’s House.”
His attitude to Christianity seems to be like that of Joseph Stalin. How many tank divisions does the Pope command, Stalin was said to have uttered. It seems the only power he understood was that which came out of the barrel of a gun. Similarly, Diocletian could not understand how a movement could replace him without military power. It did happen, however, when Constantine converted to Christianity in 312 AD.

When I look at the later history of Rome I get the impression of a civilization in crisis They searched for a solution in the form of a leader. But even the best and the brightest (and most ruthless) proved inadequate. Think of Julius Caesar.

The crisis moreover can be traced to some sort of spiritual malaise. Emperors who declared themselves to be gods were worthless.

The solution would be found in a new religion, which would ultimately ensure that Western Civilization would rise phoenix-like from the ashes of Roman civilization.
Of course it was a long time coming. Charlemagne, perhaps the first great European leader, did not appear until approximately 400 years after the fall of Rome.

This theme has of course been taken up by many writers.
Think of “Europe and the Faith” by Hilaire Belloc.
“The Everlasting Man” by G.K. Chesterton
and “How the Catholic Church built Western Civilization” by

Ultimately any religious faith someone has is a matter of personal conviction. But the idea that Classical Civilization provides an adequate basis for Western Civilization, is, I think, deeply questionable.

Another thread I would like to take up.

We sometimes hear asserted by the posters at JW the following:
Western Civilization is not based on the Judeo-Christian heritage.
It is based on Classical Civilization – Greco-Roman Civilization.

A few thoughts on this:

Classical civilization was, it would seem to me, in deep trouble, in decline really before the rise of Christianity.

I am not a professional Classical historian but I can recount the impressions I have garnered from reading, travels etc. Any more informed individual is welcome to take up this thread.

Perhaps the most important figure in Roman history, THE pivotal figure, is Julius Caesar. He transformed the Roman Republic in to the Roman Empire.
Caesar regarded himself as the ablest leader in Rome. There is also no doubt that he was motivated by personal ambition. In order to gain the position of authority he felt he deserved as was qualified for, he lead his legions across the Rubicon, sparking civil war in 49 BC.
Lest, anyone question his qualifications to lead Rome, he argued that his assination, if it happened, would be followed by even greater unrest.
His influence his felt even today. In 45 B.C. he consulted various astromoners and concluded there were 365 and a ¼ days in a year. The Julian Calendar is used still today.
He was also a deeply ruthless individual. His invasion of Gaul (France) resulted in the deaths of 700,000 people.
In 44 B.C. he was assinated. His death did not mark a return to a Republic. Instead there was a series of civil wars even worse than the one which preceded his assent to power. His prediction proved correct.

When Rome shifted from being a Republic to a sort of of monarchy, it was not a monarchy as, say, the Brits would understand it.

The Senate deified Augustus after he died. The Emperors were considered to be gods.
Then there was Caligula, the first emporer who wanted to be declaired to be a god in his own lifetime (this was considered by the Romans to be perhaps his worst outrage.)

Not only did the Emperors consider themselves gods, they persecuted Christianity.
I quote from memory but a good example of this would be Diocletian.
He instituted a policy of killing any Jews descended from King David. Why did he do this? Well he obviously felt threatened by the new religious movement. But why? He feared that it was some sort of Nationalist/military movement. A movement centered around Jesus who was, after all, “of David’s House.”
His attitude to Christianity seems to be like that of Joseph Stalin. How many tank divisions does the Pope command, Stalin was said to have uttered. It seems the only power he understood was that which came out of the barrel of a gun. Similarly, Diocletian could not understand how a movement could replace him without military power. It did happen, however, when Constantine converted to Christianity in 312 AD.

When I look at the later history of Rome I get the impression of a civilization in crisis They searched for a solution in the form of a leader. But even the best and the brightest (and most ruthless) proved inadequate. Think of Julius Caesar.

The crisis moreover can be traced to some sort of spiritual malaise. Emperors who declared themselves to be gods were worthless.

The solution would be found in a new religion, which would ultimately ensure that Western Civilization would rise phoenix-like from the ashes of Roman civilization.
Of course it was a long time coming. Charlemagne, perhaps the first great European leader, did not appear until approximately 400 years after the fall of Rome.

This theme has of course been taken up by many writers.
Think of “Europe and the Faith” by Hilaire Belloc.
“The Everlasting Man” by G.K. Chesterton
and “How the Catholic Church built Western Civilization” by Thomas E. Woods

Ultimately any religious faith someone has is a matter of personal conviction. But the idea that Classical Civilization provides an adequate basis for Western Civilization, is, I think, deeply questionable.

"However, high quality architecture does not preclude the barbaric treatment of human beings.

Posted by: schmegel "

...beautiful mosques can attest to that....

Liggett: just as there is nothing insulting in calling water wet, so there is nothing insulting in calling you a fanatic. Nor yet an ignoramus. You conveniently avoid answering to my point that there is nothing in common between John Chrysostomos and Martin Luther, and that you know nothing about them except that they did not like Jews. Which proves that you do not want to defend your knowledge of Christianity and of history - Routledge texts or otherwise.

Liggett:
There is no doubt that Jews have suffered too often over the last 2000 years at the hands of Christians. But is that the responsibility of the main figure depicted in the New Testament? Or is it a deviation from that example?

The New Testament was essential to the birth of the liberal, relatively free social order in the West today, including the West's science (as I explained above).

schmegel said:

However great a philospher Aquinas was, his opinions regarding 'heresy' demonstrate the barbarism of the time.

I agree with Archonix's response to you on this theme:

schmegel, you really are missing the point. Yes, the behaviour of protestants and catholics toward each other was pretty much the worst sort of behaviour you can imagine, but it was not inspired by scripture.

Similarly, schmegel, the death penalty for heresy goes against the actions and words of the main figure of the New Testament. That is the essential point.

Of course people often behaved barbarously during the medieval period. For one thing, the Roman Empire had collapsed and it took a long time for the West to recover. What's more, human beings don't instantly become enlightened upon being given an enlightened example, any more than children instantly grow up in the presence of parents. The deeds and words of the New Testament's central figure can only be fully understood in all their depth slowly, over centuries and millennia.

The point is, what is the historical trend that slowly unfolds in the West in substantial part because the New Testament has educated the West for 2000 years? That trend leads increasingly to a society where the individual is respected and protected against the collective, so that a true community and communion of persons with each other -- based on free individuals -- can gradually arise. That emphasis on the individual, which of course is due also to ancient Greece and Rome, has been essential to the rise of science, including Einstein's science.

Thanks Hubert the Friar for the posting on the Spengler piece: the contrast between Islam and the Biblical faiths, on prayer, viz. that in Islam prayer is the formal audience between the slave and the despot whereas for Jews and Christians it is a dialogue of lovers.

For the 'dialogue of lovers' - I recommend Jacques Lasry, "Cantique de Cantiques: Cantate Hebraique" composed in France in the ?1950s and recorded by Philips (sponsored by a Sephardi organisation). The composer was North African Jewish. The female singer in the recording is Ashkenazi - Sarah Gorby, with a gorgeous deep contralto voice. The male voice - tenor - is unnamed. They sing - ravishingly - extended excerpts from the Song of Solomon, in the original Hebrew. This text, according to tradition, is the Holy of Holies: that which is holy (marital love) signifies that which is holy (the relationship between YHWH and his beloved people).

Thanks bigcatgirl for reminding us of the exsultet. THAT is what Islam wishes to silence forever...

A propos the anti-semitism thread. To all Jews posting or reading here: I am a Gentile and a Christian. I know the shameful history of Jew-hatred that many Christians - even otherwise great theologians, tragically - have engaged in and are even now still getting sucked into; and it hurts my heart. I find it absolutely incomprehensible that people who honour a Jewish woman as 'mother of God' and a Jewish man as 'son of God' could then turn around and curse - even kill - actual living Jews. Would you be shocked if I say: BECAUSE I love that man of Nazareth, I love you? I once heard a priest say how, as he read the gospels, he found himself saying 'God! How I love that man!' Well: so do I; and the more I learn about Jesus' nation, the sheer creativity, the affirmation of life, the powers of healing and teaching that God has released through the House of Israel all the way up to the present day, then I say also, "God! How I love these people!" God bless Israel. God bless the Jews.

PS - Please, nonreligious eavesdroppers, also Buddhists and Hindus, be patient with this conversation. There are relationships within the non-Muslim 'West' that badly need healing if we are to stand with you against the onslaught of Jihad.

Meanwhile - feel free to explain how your own traditions of prayer/ devotion/ meditation compare to those of Islam. For these, too, are threatened with annihilation by jihad. (I am aware, for instance, that in India and in Cambodia prayer may be danced - by beautiful women in elaborate and exquisite costumes, see for example the documentary The Tenth Dancer).

Liggett,

In Greek, the series of Chrysostom's sermons are called Kata Ioudaiōn (Κατά Ιουδαίων), which is translated as Adversus Judaeos in Latin and Against the Jews in English. However, the most recent scholarly translations, claiming that Chrysostom's primary targets were members of his own congregation who continued to observe the Jewish feasts and fasts, give the sermons the title "Against Judaizing Christians". The original Benedictine editor of the homilies, Montfaucon, gives the following footnote to the title: "A discourse against the Jews; but it was delivered against those who were Judaizing and keeping the fasts with them [the Jews]."

As such, it is clear the original title misrepresents the contents of the discourses, which show that Chrysostom's primary targets were members of his own congregation who continued to observe the Jewish feasts and fasts. Sir Henry Savile, in his 1612 edition of Homilies 27 of Volume 6 (which is Discourse I in Patrologia Graeca's Adversus Iudaeos), gives the title: "Chrysostom's Discourse Against Those Who Are Judaizing and Observing Their Fasts.

Were Chrysostom's target the Jews themselves, certainly the Jewish Community would have suffered since Chrysostom was the most powerful man in Constantinople. They did not. In fact, at the time Constantinople had dozens of thriving synagogues. Chrysostom claimed that on the shabbats and Jewish festivals these synagogues were full of Christians, especially women, who loved the solemnity of the Jewish liturgy, enjoyed listening to the shofar on Rosh Hashanah, and applauded famous preachers in accordance with the contemporary custom. Instead Chrysostom, with the full support of most Rabbis, tried to persuade Jewish Christians, who for centuries had kept connections with Jews and Judaism, to choose between Judaism and Christianity. Those who chose Judaism over Christianity suffered no penalties other than verbal condemnation.