Jihad Watch: Mano a mano: Spencer v Derbyshire

August 23, 2007

Mano a mano: Spencer v Derbyshire

Here, from Pajamas Media, is my response to John Derbyshire's brightly written review of my book Religion of Peace?.

John Derbyshire seems to think that since, in his view, Islam and Christianity are equally preposterous, they are equally likely to incite violence: “Mohammed’s flying through the air to Jerusalem on a white steed is no more preposterous than the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception; and so, God’s instructions to us through Mohammed are no more or less likely to make us better or worse than his instructions through Christ.”
Huh? “And so”? One thing is unbelievable, and so is another, and therefore they’re of equal moral value? Come now. I myself find National Socialism no more preposterous than Shakerism – does that mean that National Socialism is no more or less likely to make us better or worse than Shakerism? Does Derbyshire really want to get behind the idea that if something doesn’t ring true to him, it is therefore benign, or at least no more or less benign than some other farrago? I don’t think he does, even as he calls the whole exercise “infantile,” since he also says that he finds my “brief against Islam” to be “persuasive.”

Derbyshire’s review, while marvelously written and delightful to read, is full of inconsistencies. I don’t see how he could possibly find what I reveal about Islam to be “persuasive” if at the same time he thinks that Islamic and Christian doctrine are equally likely to inspire their adherents to commit acts of brutality, since the contrary assertion, as he himself notes, is a major point of my book. He also wonders whether “an equally learned Islamic scholar, bent on making the opposite case, might not produce equally persuasive points, to be then rebutted by Spencer, who would be re-rebutted by the Islamist…” I would welcome such a rebuttal, by the way, unless it were characterized by the torrents of abuse and sly deceptions and diversions that usually come to me from Islamic spokesmen in America, but the point is that while Derbyshire says he is persuaded, he evidently still suspects that I am just engaging in some kind of rhetorical sleight of hand.

And that is by no means the only inconsistency, alas, that mars his elegantly written and thoroughly entertaining review. Derbyshire asserts that “it can hardly be disputed that we have got into the mess we are in with Islam today not so much because of the letter of Islamic theology…as because we have executed policies of staggering idiocy.” Yet what is the nature of that staggering idiocy? The fact that “there are now tens of millions of Muslims living in Christian nations; and this is the case because our nations allowed the tens of millions to enter.” Yet why would that be a problem, if Islam were like Christianity – absurd but ultimately harmless at its core? Obviously the problem with allowing tens of millions of Muslims into the West has to do with “the letter of Islamic theology,” which Derbyshire dismissed as irrelevant just before complaining about the admission of so many adherents of what he sees as a wacky but unthreatening creed.
Derbyshire asks if it is “actually that important” to take on the “‘equivalence’ school of thought, the one that says that there isn’t anything to choose between Christianity and Islam in the way of militancy or obscurantism.” A few weeks ago I was on a TV show on France 24, where I explained that jihadists recruited among peaceful Muslims by referring to the teachings of the Qur’an and Sunnah and presenting themselves as the exponents of true or pure Islam. One of the other guests on the show then responded by asserting that there were passages of the Bible that were equally violent as anything in the Qur’an, and anyway, what about the Crusades? This kind of howling irrelevancy is extraordinarily common; even conservatives such as Ralph Peters, Arnaud de Borchgrave and Dinesh D’Souza have made similar statements on the way to claiming that it was misguided, futile, and somehow in poor taste to investigate the ways in which Islamic texts are used to incite violence. We are supposed to believe, as Christiane Amanpour’s recent CNN series would also have us believe, that all religious traditions have their nutcases, and all of them are marginal, discredited by the majority, and ultimately insignificant. But this – and I’m sure Mr. Derbyshire can appreciate this distinction – is a dogma, not an established fact. And if it is false (and it is), it may be blinding us in numerous ways to the nature and the magnitude of the problem we face, as well as to the steps we need to take to protect ourselves. This cuts both ways: if Christian theocrats are really the threat Chris Hedges, Barry Lynn, and Kevin Phillips think they are, it only plays into the sinister hands of the Bushitler to focus attention on the adherents of the Religion of Peace. This may seem irredeemably nutso to John Derbyshire, but Hedges’ book was a bestseller: considerable numbers of people out there are taking the Christian theocracy scare very, very seriously. So my book is an examination of both threats and both traditions, an examination that has clear, important, and numerous policy implications.

Derbyshire manifests no greater comprehension when denigrating my assertion that Christianity provided the philosophical framework within which modern science could grow and develop, and adduces a few miracle stories from the Bible as proof-texts to the contrary. He dismisses as “Catholic apologetics” without examination the entire extended discussion in my book of the view of God in Catholic scholastic philosophy as good and consistent, versus the Islamic view of Allah as absolute will, unrestricted by any requirement of consistency. The scholastic philosophers believed in miracles too, while managing to create a foundation for scientific investigation by positing this consistency. While I always admire the verve of his writing, I believe Derbyshire has given this point short shrift. “And even if it were true that the church midwifed science,” he says, “is it not the case that, following delivery of the newborn, the midwife’s services are no longer required?” The quip is nice; the thought, shallow. Is it not the case that science, unbounded by any moral sense, leads to dehumanization? (See Aldous Huxley for details.)

But I digress. The ringing peroration of Derbyshire’s review is his declaration that while “Islamia has sunk into the grip of a poisonous ideology—the ideology of jihadism—the Christian West (Spencer actually says ‘Judeo-Christian,’ but that is just a lagniappe) has been seized by an even more destructive ideology: globalization.” (Not a lagniappe at all, but that is a discussion for another time.) He claims that “a great enabler of globalization has been the Christian tradition. If all men are brothers, heathens only a little less enlightened than Christians, they why should not a Pakistani, or a Somali, or for that matter a Mexican, come to live in the U.S.A.?”

One may wonder, given this line of reasoning, why Catholic Europe, at the apex of its self-conscious religiosity, didn’t throw open its doors to the jihadist invaders instead of resisting them. One may wonder why the United States, governed in the main by Protestant Christians for the most part throughout its history, maintained relatively sane immigration policies until the 1960s. Were the Sixties, when immigration controls were effectively ended and globalization gained immense momentum, a time of some great Christian revival? In reality, Christianity has no inherent connection at all with open-borders insanity and globalization. No less prominent a Christian than St. Thomas Aquinas expressed the mainstream Christian view when he said that “after his duties towards God, man owes most to his parents and his country. One’s duties towards one’s parents include one’s obligations towards one’s relatives, because these latter have sprung from [or are connected by ties of blood with] one’s parents…and the services due to one’s country have for their object all one’s fellow-countrymen and all the friends of one’s fatherland.” An open-borders globalist? Not quite.

Then Derbyshire takes me to task for not offering any policy suggestions in this book, although he acknowledges that “possibly he has laid out a program in one of his other books (none of which I have read) and feels no need to repeat himself.” That is indeed the case, and perhaps I should have repeated myself, since the recommendations I have made in several books are no closer to being implemented now than they were when I wrote them. I am not asking Mr. Derbyshire to invest in my older books, as I do not wish to tax his patience unduly with an issue that he has previously described as “stupefyingly dull” (although of course to me my earlier books are jam-packed with boffo, riveting stuff, but never mind), so I’ll summarize them here: they include restrictions on Muslim immigration; a Manhattan Project to find new energy sources and free the U.S. from foreign policy dependence upon Saudi Arabia; an adjustment of our international alliances so as to make aid to states like Egypt and Pakistan contingent upon their actively limiting the teaching of the jihad ideology of Islamic supremacism within their borders; the reclassification of American Muslim groups as political groups, subject to all the scrutiny and accountability to which political groups are normally subject, given the intrinsic political nature of the Sharia; a call to Muslims in America to initiate comprehensive, transparent programs to teach against the aspects of Islam that are at variance with American law and values; and more.

I have said these things and more plainly in Onward Muslim Soldiers, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), and The Truth About Muhammad. I am not afraid, as Derbyshire posits, of being “cast out from the sphere of ‘acceptable’ commentary into the outer darkness of fringe politics and ‘hate groups’—a term which nowadays seems to embrace anyone who speaks unwelcome truths out loud.” For he is indeed correct that the “hate” label is readily affixed today to anyone who states truths that others find inconvenient for the public to know, and for those on both the Left and the Right (and yes, there are many on the Right) who allow themselves to be manipulated in this way I have nothing but contempt.

As for Derbyshire’s own prescriptions (offered if what I say is true, which he really isn’t sure about), some have a good deal to recommend them, and as he says, there is nothing inherently “immoral or improper” about them. (Others are pure foolishness: bribing Muslims to leave will only drain the treasury: once you start paying for something, you’ve established the need for a supply – almost certainly some would take the money, leave, and come back to take the money again.) They are, of course even more remote from current political reality than mine above, and they spring ultimately from Derbyshire’s lack of belief in the Transcendent: without confidence in the power of truth, there is nothing left but force. Muslims are here in the West, and the hard political reality is that there will only be more of them, and hence more jihadists and Islamic supremacists, in the coming years. We should continue to strive to bring the implications of our disastrous immigration policies and other manifestations of willful ignorance and foolishness to public notice, but we will not be able to rely on law and force alone to get us out of this fix. Thus one last bastion of hope that the Judeo-Christian West does have is that the heart and mind are not immutable. We will have to wage ideological battle on behalf of our threatened civilizational values – a battle for which we are well equipped, as I argue in Religion of Peace?, but which virtually no one is fighting. The truth will out, even against a relentless totalitarianism that appears inexorable. But only if we have the courage to defend it.

That truth, of course, is not coterminous with the desiccated and vacuous Christianity that prevails in so many places today. Derbyshire gets off some of his most engaging shots by playing up that hollow shell as the real thing: “If there were a proposal to impose Sharia law in your town, who would you rather see riding to your aid: Christopher Hitchens, or Bishop Muskens?” – that is, the befuddled Dutch bishop who recommends that Christians in the Netherlands, not hitherto known for speaking Arabic, begin to refer to God as “Allah” to please and pacify their Muslim neighbors. Answer: I’d fight alongside Hitchens in a heartbeat, if he would deign to fight alongside me, which is the real question. In my book, as Derbyshire notes, I call for an alliance with atheists, among others, but for his part I am not sure whether Hitchens would identify me as part of the problem or part of the solution. And there’s the problem: we know we’re under attack, but we have to figure out who or what the enemy is in order to be able to fight properly. Is it religious people? Religion itself? Islamic jihad? Christian theocracy? Determining the answer is the purpose of my book.

But John Derbyshire also wonders whether or not “the humane forbearance of the Prince of Peace, and the moral universalism that His teachings imply, bear the seeds of self-destruction,” and whether the followers of that Prince really have the strength to withstand the onslaught: “If—to put faces on the abstractions—Roger Cardinal Mahoney [sic] and his parishioners were to engage in a waste-lot rumble with Abu Ayyub al-Masri and his parishioners, on which party would Robert Spencer put his money?” On Al-Masri, of course. But aren’t you stacking the deck here a bit? What if Richard Coeur de Lion were to happen upon this waste-lot rumble? Charlemagne? St. Louis IX? Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Walter Ciszek? Alexander Solzhenitsyn? John Paul II?

“Christianity,” Derbyshire concludes, “got its start as a religion of slaves. Perhaps it is fated to end the same way.” Perhaps. But those slaves ultimately captured the empire that enslaved them, and transformed it.

Posted by Robert at August 23, 2007 3:04 PM
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Comments
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Does John Derbyshire really know the difference between Mohammmed on Al-Buraq ascending the heavens and God conferring extraordinary graces on the female offspring of Joachim and Anne before he drew his inferences?

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 3:28 PM

lagniappe

Main Entry: la·gniappe
Pronunciation: ‘lan-”yap
Function: noun
Etymology: American French, from American Spanish la ñapa the lagniappe, from la + ñapa, yapa, from Quechua yapa something added
: a small gift given a customer by a merchant at the time of a purchase; broadly : something given or obtained gratuitously or by way of good measure

Posted by: Infidel Pride

at August 23, 2007 3:32 PM

Robert, you truly are an admirable gentleman for your too gracious evaluation of JD's nonsense.

Or am I the only one left who believes that logic and "consistency" are essential elements of "elegant" writing?

Please forgive the quibble ... but is there really such a thing a beautifully written nonsense?

JD's logical errors are so fundmental to his review, the article can only be named for the garbage it is.

And, once again, our purported intellectuals, writers for our purported intellectual periodicals, simply demonstrate how depressing this war against mohammed-worship and jihad is going to be, until a lot of people get over themselves.

Posted by: Moonzoo

at August 23, 2007 3:36 PM

He shoots, he scores!

Posted by: Elric66

at August 23, 2007 3:41 PM

As Hugh once pointed out, a serious belief in the teachings of Jesus and an extreme practice of the teachings of Jesus may bring one to the point of St. Francis or Dorothy Day. What will the serious and extreme teachings of the Quaran and the emulation of Muhammad bring one to? Can anyone see Muhammad giving the Sermon on the Mount or "turning the other cheek" when standing their ground with someone like Muhammad?

Posted by: Frank

at August 23, 2007 3:41 PM

Jesus:

"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

muhammad:
(9:5) Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.;

(9:28) O ye who believe! The idolaters only are unclean. So let them not come near the Inviolable Place of Worship after this their year. If ye fear poverty (from the loss of their merchandise) Allah shall preserve you of His bounty if He will. Lo! Allah is Knower, Wise.;

(4:101) And when ye go forth in the land, it is no sin for you to curtail (your) worship if ye fear that those who disbelieve may attack you. In truth the disbelievers are an open enemy to you.;

(9:123) O ye who believe! Fight those of the disbelievers who are near to you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that Allah is with those who keep their duty (unto Him).;

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2

at August 23, 2007 3:46 PM

I can't help wondering if Derbyshire doesn't know the difference between the immaculate conception and the virgin birth and actually meant to refer to the latter. But it would be difficult to prove.

As I said in comments on another blog, Derbyshire needs to watch that everlasting sneer. You know what your old mother used to say: "One day your face is going to get stuck like that, and _then_ won't you be sorry?"

Posted by: Lydia

at August 23, 2007 3:50 PM

Does this "John Derbyshire" get paid for his works? it is sad to say that probably he does get paid to fill some pages. His point of all religions being equally bad is very common fodder among the liberal elites, and even some Conservative thinkers. This is true laziness on Mr.Derbshire's part that he writes his tripe without doing his homework. send him to the comic strip!

Posted by: ZenaWarriorPrincess

at August 23, 2007 3:50 PM

The Greek and Roman slaves who chose Christianity did so willingly, even to the point of martyrdom.

Islamic slaves are converted by the sword, born into Islam and unable to leave, or convert through a one-way door, never to be seen again.

And then there are the Infidel slaves who refused to convert.

Posted by: CapitalistGig

at August 23, 2007 3:51 PM

I WANT YOU

for the Jihad Awareness Project.

We are in the middle of the tenth day of posting this request at Jihad Watch, and we are up to 55 volunteers in 31 states.

WE STILL ARE SEEKING CITIZEN VOLUNTEERS FROM ALL 50 STATES, ESPECIALLY FROM THE FOLLOWING 19:

Alabama
Connecticut
Delaware
Hawaii
Kansas
Louisiana
Michigan
Mississippi
Montana
Nebraska
New Jersey
North Dakota
Oklahoma
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Utah
Vermont
West Virginia
Wyoming

I'm looking for at least two people in every state of the Union who would be willing to purchase a copy of Robert Spencer's Religion of Peace? Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't and mail it, on an agreed upon date, to one of the senators in your state. I'm organizing an effort to get the book simultaneously to all 100 senators, in order to send a strong message. If we get more than two people per state, books can also be sent to the House of Representatives.

If you’d like to be involved, please write to me at traehnam@yahoo.com under the subject heading “Senate,” and tell me the state your senator represents, an email address where I can reach you, and a nickname. No need for your real name. And I will never share your email address with anyone, not even with other volunteers for this project.

And visit www.jihadawareness.blogspot.com to get more info on this project and to leave comments other volunteers can read. You can also see there the growing list of participants in this project, and the states their senators represent. I’ll try to update the list at least once a day. I've also designed a graphic that might amuse. Scroll down when you get to the site.

Once we have at least two people from every state, we can agree on a mailing date and then each of us can mail a copy of the book on that date.

Right before each of us mails the book, we can issue a press release to various media outlets in every state, and in that way announce and explain the mailing. And perhaps we can come up with some other ways of maximizing the effectiveness of this project and gaining as much positive attention as possible.

One of the project's volunteers suggested contacting Rep. Sue Myrick, who started the anti-Jihad caucus in Congress. I'll try to coordinate this project with Rep. Myrick to maximize its effectiveness. I've also been calling various congressional offices to get advice on how best to go about this. And I'll soon contact Regnery, Robert Spencer's publisher, to ask their advice and to see if we can coordinate with them in some way.

Posted by: traeh

at August 23, 2007 3:52 PM

In my mind I see Mohammed embarked on his Mirage mounted on a steed with a sphinx's head, a horse's body, a lion's tail--an Arabian Nights story. On the other hand, I see Israel Personified in the humble person of Mary, idealized and perfected.

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 3:56 PM

“Why are we watching infidels prosper in this world and not stopping them?” Sheik Abu Abdullah, a young-looking man sporting a black turban and a neat black beard, asked a silent crowd of 50 people gathered at the al-Faruq mosque in Kfar Aqab last night. The audience, all men, most middle-class professionals, sat in silence as a battery of ceiling fans sliced through the humid night air.

Typical Muslim reaction. All that oil money and they cant prosper so their reaction is to make life miserable for people that made something out of their lives.

Posted by: Elric66

at August 23, 2007 3:58 PM

“And even if it were true that the church midwifed science,” he says, “is it not the case that, following delivery of the newborn, the midwife’s services are no longer required?”

Alchemy is an impediment to understanding chemistry. Astrology is an impediment to understanding, not just astronomy, but all of science. Just because a school of thought led to something great does not mean it has enduring value; it must continually justify itself. And mere opposition to something flawed is not justification; just because the creed of the jihadists belongs on the trashheap of history does not mean that anything opposed to it may not also have deep flaws.

Is it not the case that science, unbounded by any moral sense, leads to dehumanization? (See Aldous Huxley for details.)

"Brave New World" is not only fiction, but its fictional society is the product of many moral choices in addition to science. The morality which sees it proper to create a society with a small ruling elite engineered by intelligence is nowhere implicit in science.

And I notice you're begging the question "What moral sense should determine our bounds?" You can say "not Islam" (and I'll heartily agree), but that doesn't resolve the question.

considerable numbers of people out there are taking the Christian theocracy scare very, very seriously.

And I'll tell you why:

Among the Christians, those with theocratic tendencies are the furthest from the mainstream.

Only the Christian theocrats are sufficiently numerous, and have co-opted enough well-meaning fellow believers, to threaten the Constitutional separation of church and state.

There is an additional threat there. Once the church/state barrier is gone or even weakened, Islamists can use the opening to take the reins of government in the name of their religion. The Founding Fathers were painfully aware of the dangers of sectarian government even when everyone was some variety of Christian. Re-introducing sectarianism with Islam in the mix is at least ten times as dangerous. Locking Islam away from the levers of power after mixing civil and religious law means establishing one religion as official: there's your theocracy, by the back door.

Folks on anti-jihad websites like to talk about the left as having a death wish for Western society. What so many Christians don't realize is that the West is powered by Enlightenment values rather than faith, and they can just as easily undermine their own foundations and send themselves back to the Middle Ages.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 23, 2007 4:06 PM

"What if Richard Coeur de Lion were to happen upon this waste-lot rumble? Charlemagne? St. Louis IX? Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Walter Ciszek? Alexander Solzhenitsyn? John Paul II?"

Robert,

A former Bush administration official (Rumsfeld, I believe) said "you go to war with the army you have". Most of the people on your list are long dead. What we have are the Roger Mahonys. That is our ragtag army in 2007. It's not clear that any of them have the stomach for this fight. They are too vested in PC and "let's all get along". Charlemagne, Charles Martel and many more are no longer with us. We have to fight this battle without them.

When Bush addressed Congress after 9/11, I thought he and Tony Blair would be our leaders. They soon proved incapable of overcoming political correctness and diplomatic inertia.

Posted by: PMK

at August 23, 2007 4:14 PM

Did I forget to mention Al-Buraq's wings? I suppose it's implied. But then again, I dont see the Woman of Revelation's male child ascending into heaven on a winged mount.

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 4:15 PM

It all started when (for instance) radical feminists began to blur the line between a brutal rapist and some guy who has a cheesecake picture in his locker.

The 'equivalency' game will end in heaps and heaps of corpses(ours).

Posted by: poetcomic1

at August 23, 2007 4:18 PM

I enjoyed reading Robert Spencer's response to John Derbyshire's review. Well done, Mr. Spencer!

Posted by: Josephine

at August 23, 2007 4:19 PM

Robert,

Excellent rebuttal. It was extremely inspiring to read such an affable exegesis on your remonstration.

Cheers,

Doctor Bulldog

Posted by: Doctor Bulldog

at August 23, 2007 4:22 PM

P.S. -

My wife bought me one of those fancy-schmancy thesauruses so that my writing wouldn't be so, "Folksy." *Grin*

Cheers,

Doctor Bulldog

Posted by: Doctor Bulldog

at August 23, 2007 4:28 PM

Let't have Reason, yes, but alloyed with the fruits of Faith animated by Love. Many of us have a tendency toward one-dimentional excess.

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 4:29 PM

--I meant one-dimenSional excess.

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 4:31 PM

Critical comments not welcome on CNN

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/08/22/amanpour.answers/index.html

Posted by: Elric66

at August 23, 2007 4:32 PM

"the reclassification of American Muslim groups as political groups, subject to all the scrutiny and accountability to which political groups are normally subject, given the intrinsic political nature of the Sharia; a call to Muslims in America to initiate comprehensive, transparent programs to teach against the aspects of Islam that are at variance with American law and values; and more."

........I like these ideas.....100%.........call em what they are....

...and Ban Muslim Immigration.

Posted by: exsgtbrown

at August 23, 2007 4:37 PM

Elric66,

I agree. Unless you are in awestruck deference to Queen Amanpour, fully buying into her religious moral equivalence nonsense, you have no chance of getting a post through.

I gave it the old college try though.

It's interesting to see today with CNN, as with other liberal sites like Rachel's Tavern, that liberals really have no interest in allowing alternate viewpoints or respectful debate and attempt to stifle free speech at every turn.

On a side note, I watched the first two episodes and in no way saw a validation of a religious moral equivalence between Judaism and Islam. I have to wonder what show everyone else was watching?

Posted by: awake

at August 23, 2007 4:44 PM

posted by Elric66

Where is the link for the video? I'd like to be able to forwarded it to those who need a little light of truth shone in their faces.

Posted by: senor doeboy

at August 23, 2007 4:45 PM

I tried abiut 10 comments and nothing went through. Nothing hateful just critical. well one comment was "I guess I have to kiss ass to get a comment through". That too didnt go through. :-)

Just goes to prove liberals hate debate. Racheltavern proved it yesterday and CNN did again today. Rachel can come here and comment all she wants. You hear that Rachel? :-)

Posted by: Elric66

at August 23, 2007 4:48 PM

Elric66 can you provide the link to the quote from above. I really would love to send it to a few friends.

posted by Elric66

Posted by: senor doeboy

at August 23, 2007 4:56 PM

EP wrote:

Alchemy is an impediment to understanding chemistry. Astrology is an impediment to understanding, not just astronomy, but all of science.

Alchemy was a spiritual science not materials engineering. Read some damn history of Alchemy for once. And where are the hordes of astrologers that have impeded the nerds of science? they only exist in the minds of feverish nerds that are terrified of dumpy women who read the daily horoscope.

"Folks on anti-jihad websites like to talk about the left as having a death wish for Western society. What so many Christians don't realize is that the West is powered by Enlightenment values rather than faith, and they can just as easily undermine their own foundations and send themselves back to the Middle Ages.

The left does have a death wish for the west and everything it stands for. They embrace Islamists and even outright terrorist supporters and label even moderate Cbristians as Nazis and Taliban.

Leftists see nothing wrong with honor killings, the implementation of the shariah, murdering of non-Muslims by Muslims.

But if a Christian says abortion is wrong call out the police and hide the leftists with slight constitutions.

As far as the west becoming a Christian state, it only exists in the deluded minds of leftists who don't have a clue. Europe is basically a collection of atheist welfare states, those secularist dopes are the ones welcoming in Muslims by the tens of thousands and helping them implement shariah.

If anything it will be the leftists who usher in theocratic Europe that takes its orders from Mecca.

Posted by: waltc

at August 23, 2007 5:17 PM

Can you imagine someone confronting Muhammad and the teachings of the Quran and being moved by Muhammad and the Quaran as the writer of this hymn was by the presence of Jesus....

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4357921463168655508

Posted by: Frank

at August 23, 2007 5:22 PM

Engineer-Poet,

If theocratic Christians are marginal, and there is no consensus (nor likely emerging) among Christians for theocracy (apart from legitimate engagement with the world), how does that compare with the large and growing numbers of Muslims seeking a restored Caliphate, imposition of Sharia, and Muslim supremacy achieved by whatever means, even bin Laden's?

Enlightenment values or not, we have to hang together, not separately. There are so many fronts of this existential struggle, resistance requires everyone of us.

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 5:24 PM

Disease vector control requires identification of the sources and methodology of how the disease spreads. Mohamedism started with Mohammed in what is now the Arabian peninsula, which may not have been initially too dangerous, but then it spread through swift infections to large populations of predominantly Christian nations of the Middle East and North Africa. What Spencer identified correctly in his book “Religion of Peace?” is the un-peaceful nature of this spreading vector, subjugation with much death and suffering to large populations of people who were minding their own affairs until the Caliphs’ armies of Islam attacked them with jihad war. Once conquered, if not killed and sold off into slavery, the survivors were then infected to carry on the jihad wars into as yet un-infected areas, from Spain to India. With jet travel, health risks have increased exponentially.

Derbyshire understands, it seems, that this disease has now invaded the West, especially western Europe, but he still denies that such a disease spread is due to deadly pathogens it carries, as if all disease vectors carry similar pathogens. Where Spencer excels is to dispel this erroneous assumption, that both are Abrahamically benign, so Christianity is no better or worse than Islam. But where Christ’s religious posterity infects mildly, perhaps even benignly or not at all in its efforts to save souls, its more pathologically virulent neighbor Islam infects deeply to conquer the world for Allah, and often proves fatal. This is as true today as it was 1400 years ago, which proves the efficacy of this infection. Good disease control requires not only to identify the source of this spreading vector, but how to stop it, either through quarantine or antidotes until it ceases to infect. The antidote is for those not yet infected to inoculate themselves with a strong dose of knowledge about the nature and atmospherics of the disease, or quarantine it to its source. Derbyshire got the quarantine part right, but Spencer then digs deeper into immunology. Either way, both are needed to control this massively spreading disease before it kills more peaceful people around the world.

Multiculturalists, and religious apologists, still opposed to or misunderstanding the nature of this pathology, are ignoring early warning signs of infection. Religious disease vectors are not all equally benign. While some religions prove beneficial to human life, even uplifting in their daily lives, others prove debilitating, even fatal. Political Sharia Islam is not benign, unlike other private faiths, and its jihad often proves fatal.

Posted by: Battle_of_Tours

at August 23, 2007 5:35 PM

For my taste finding the Bible just as preposterous as the Quran, or more concretely the immaculate conception just as preposterous as Mohammeds riding to Jerusalem is like comparing Shakespeare with the Hadiths and saying they're both telly-tales.

Mr. Derbyshire should study some ancient mythology, a bit of symbolic a.s.o. bevor he starts speaking publicly such a nonsense.

The so called immaculate conception ist to be lead so far back as the birth of Gilgamesh. There were many Gods and Halfgods in the ancient mythologies born out of an immaculate conception, with a heavenly parent: Gilgamesh, Herkules, Alexander the Great, etc. There is a large scale of symbolical meanings in this immaculate conception, much more than a simple biological absurdity, as he might understand it.

On the other hand is Mohammeds flying to Jerusalem a very plump construction of greedy, simple minded people of later times, in order to justify their "right claim" on Jerusalem.

Main parts of the islamic mythology are apparently of later origine than the muslims claim them to be and you really don't have any proof that those stories should be as old as Mohammeds time. Just take the sure 5:57;58 and think a little about it: when did the jews and christians started to mock about moslems calling to prayer. I don't know any other religious practices to be mocked at as much as the muezzins calling and the muslims praying the way they do.

Posted by: Kybeline

at August 23, 2007 5:35 PM

Quite clearly, I believe, Derbyshire was trying to refer to the miraculous event of the "Virgin Birth," but erroneously called it the "Immaculate Conception." A common mistake among those illiterate on Christian theology. Immaculate Conception being the conception of Mary without original sin. Was this the unbelievable event Derbyshire spoke of??? If so, he was openly proclaiming his acceptance for the theological tenet of Original sin.

This ignorance sort of reminds me of people who mention the book of "Revelations." Of course, there is no book in the Bible. (The last book of the N.T. is The Revelation of Jesus Christ.)

Anyway, Robert great response. Excellent book too, I just finished!

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 23, 2007 6:15 PM

@Engineer-Poet
There is an additional threat there. Once the church/state barrier is gone or even weakened, Islamists can use the opening to take the reins of government in the name of their religion. The Founding Fathers were painfully aware of the dangers of sectarian government even when everyone was some variety of Christian. Re-introducing sectarianism with Islam in the mix is at least ten times as dangerous. Locking Islam away from the levers of power after mixing civil and religious law means establishing one religion as official: there's your theocracy, by the back door.

I agree that Enlightement drives many of the policies of the government. But even that is tempered (or has been in the past) with faith values (I am using your words, I would use Christian values). If what you propose were true why hasn't this happen in the last 200 years of our countries life. I agree it could happen today or in the near future because of the lack of influence the Christians have in society. That is were the real battle is today. On top of that is the threat from outside by Islam and it's Sharia law.

The church/state barrier is under attack but by those that wish to remove any thought, value or control (I speak in terms of the positive) that Christian values have influenced this country. The founding fathers limited the roll of the government to allow the free expression of faith to have a positive influence on society and the government. They had seen how the government had miss used it that is why they limited its power, but they never wish to have it removed for public discourse or influence.

I don't think demoting Islam as a religion and outlawing it is a threat to the first amendment rather it is a way of protecting it from an enemy that would nullify it given the chance. They IMO are actively at it today through legal means and they are pushing their agenda by using the system just under the threshold of illegal.

Mark 3:25-27
And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan rise up against himself, and be divided, he cannot stand, but hath an end. No man can enter into a strong man's house, and spoil his goods, except he will first bind the strong man; and then he will spoil his house.

Posted by: Im.mad.as.HELL!

at August 23, 2007 6:49 PM

Robert said

(Others are pure foolishness: bribing Muslims to leave will only drain the treasury: once you start paying for something, you’ve established the need for a supply – almost certainly some would take the money, leave, and come back to take the money again.)

This was a surprise to me. I wouldn't term it "bribery", I'd call it "relocation expenses". To prevent someone from coming back and taking it again, firstly we shouldn't allow them back in, and secondly, any dispersal of money should be contingent upon submitting biometric data (fingerprint, retina scan, earlobe scan, etc.), which would be useful in itself after the process was complete.

If this idea is foolishness, then what is the alternative? Of course many Arab nations forcibly and violently deported Jews with no remuneration; would we have the constitution to do the same to them? It would be far more foolish (and expensive) in my opinion to allow the current status quo to continue. It would be far, FAR more foolish to rely on winning the "hearts and minds" of the Muslims already here, and hoping for an Islamic Reformation.

I hope that Robert expands on this topic at some point.

Posted by: special_guest

at August 23, 2007 7:24 PM

I finally read Derbyshire's writeup - and I couldn't believe that someone would write such things without knowing too much about what he is writing about (eg: islamic history, the koran/hadiths/surrahs, their stated goals, etc). He took as gospel one person's idea of Catholicism which to me doesn't base a conclusion of anything on. I don't judge a whole group of people on one person's opinion.

But, some of his conclusions I actually... agree with. We should have closed our borders to muslims, if we were smart. And because we didn't, because we behaved as Christians, we are now in a bit of a pickle (to say the very least!).

Overall, his writeup hurt my head. He should have taken on his chosen task with a little more caution if he doesn't know his history and/or is unable to put one and one together after looking at the overall picture. I think he wanted to dislike the book and he proved it to himself that he didn't like it.

Posted by: R_not

at August 23, 2007 7:28 PM

Folks, don't let David Mathews, a wolf in sheep's clothing, get away with lies about Robert Spencer:

On the comments threads under Robert Spencer's article over at Pajamas Media, a sociopath commenting as "David Mathews" -- I think he's the felonious phony "Rev" Jim Sutter -- is savaging Robert Spencer as the equivalent of Osama Bin Laden, talking as if Spencer agreed with the KKK, asserting that Spencer intends for huge numbers of Muslims to die, and saying all sorts of other lies in a glib manner full of pseudo-facts that may succeed in persuading the innocent who happen by the site.

I'm convinced that Mathews is deliberately and consciously lying about Spencer in order to discredit him with anyone happening by the Pajamas Media site. Mathews, I believe, has a hidden motive: either he is a paid shill for CAIR or Saudi Arabia or the like; or as a sociopath, he gets pleasure out of a manipulative game.

Posted by: traeh

at August 23, 2007 7:33 PM

Robert said

the reclassification of American Muslim groups as political groups, subject to all the scrutiny and accountability to which political groups are normally subject, given the intrinsic political nature of the Sharia; a call to Muslims in America to initiate comprehensive, transparent programs to teach against the aspects of Islam that are at variance with American law and values;

Gee, thanks Robert, for making my hopes come true.

I think it would be expensive to allow Muslims to come here, and then set up a bureacracy to watch over them. We'd need to train a whole new generation of Arab-speaking law enforcement personnel. It would be expensive, and also be prone to failure, with predictable results. Also, relying on Islam to transform itself into a tolerant religion of peace requires more optimism than I can summon up without a crack-pipe.

Posted by: special_guest

at August 23, 2007 7:40 PM

traeh: what a great project ... ty for your efforts! Spencer's books really need as much circulation as possible.

Peaceful Muslims: Perhaps one person out of a hundred understands or knows the distinction between the immaculate conception and the virgin birth. It is sort of like people using the word "penultimate" to mean the really, really ultimate, or using the word "enormity" to mean really really enormous, or using the phrase "beg the question" to mean really really begging to ask a particular question.

So widespread is the lack of curiosity, and of ignorance. And for the most part, it's not a big deal; such is life and humanity.

But when a Derbyshire does not understand the distinction between the immaculate conception and the virgin birth, as surely he does not, it is disturbing. Derbyshire is among the best we can do for public discourse?

One of the rare pleasures in life is this site, and Spencer's books, because of the rare integrity and simple erudition they reflect, among other qualities, in a mess of phony drivel faced by any sentient human each day.

Don't get me wrong. Phony drivel has been and always be a major part of the human condition.

What the West needs now, though, are intellectual warriors. That is why Spencer and Fitzgerald are inspiring, and just plain fun to read.

Posted by: Moonzoo

at August 23, 2007 8:02 PM

Kybeline,

Peaceful is correct; the Immaculate Conception doesn't refer to virgin birth or virginal conception.

Parthenogenesis or virgin birth has parellels in ancient mythology, yes; and a yearning for a demigod hero resonated with the Ancients (and still does--mahdism, messianism--today).

Posted by: John C

at August 23, 2007 8:30 PM

Engineer-Poet,

Once the church/state barrier is gone or even weakened, Islamists can use the opening to take the reins of government in the name of their religion.

You assume that Islam will be considered a religion in perpetuity. Just because the mob calls itself a legitimate Italian businessman's club doesn't mean the rest of us believe that, either.

As for your point about "Enlightenment" values, while I share your concern, that concern is mitigated by two factors:

1. A lot of what Christianity preaches actually dovetails quite nicely with "Enlightenment values", at least as taught in the ethics of Kant, for example. If you consider "60's values" as completely aligned with "Enlightenment values", you might have some issues with Kant. While I am not eager to have Christianity installed as state religion (check out my username for proof),

2. The threat from Islam is a threat to both faith AND reason, which was the essential point Pope Benedict made in his speech about Paleologos. The Muslim world excels in nothing, save fanaticism, so in any rational prioritization of threats, it has to rank at the top.

I find the whole "moral equivalence" argument between the two brands of "theocracy" to be, ironically, a failure of self-proclaimed empiricists to be sufficiently empirical.

As a real "empiricist", I find the threat of a Muslim theocracy about a thousand times more threatening than that of a Christian theocracy.

That's even taking into account my estimated probability of each actually coming to pass, to account for the very lame argument that Muslims are a small population in America while Christians are a large population. A 1% chance of a Muslim theocracy is worse than a 99% chance of a Christian theocracy. Islam is just that bad.

Posted by: venividivici

at August 23, 2007 9:10 PM

I find the whole "moral equivalence" argument between the two brands of "theocracy" to be, ironically, a failure of self-proclaimed empiricists to be sufficiently empirical.

VVV: Nice.

Posted by: Moonzoo

at August 23, 2007 9:25 PM

I tried to submit a comment to the Pajamas media site in response to the troll "Dave Matthews", (who also hit traeh's site the other day) but its in limbo somewhere and since the last comment accepted was back around 6pm, and since I bothered to type the darn thing (into a Word document, having become savvy about these "lost post" things by now), I reckon I'll post it here, absent all the relevant context:

Dave Mathews: "Christians have an obligation to struggle against hate, prejudice, bigotry, and violence ... even when these are exhibited by fellow Christians."

To Dave Matthews:

Don't Christians then likewise have an obligation to struggle against hate, prejudice, bigotry, and violence when these things are exhibited by Muslims as well?

It's actually interesting that you add "EVEN when these are exhibited by fellow Christians”.

Because that is an admission that Christians are in fact obligated to struggle against these things EVEN when they are NOT exhibited by fellow Christians”.

Because that is what your post implies – that Christians do indeed have an obligation to struggle against against hate, prejudice, bigotry, and violence.

Do you deny that Muslims worldwide are showing daily evidence of hate, prejudice, bigotry and violence?

Do you actually read jihadwatch and dhimmiwatch every day? Because if you did you would come to the inescapable conclusion that Muslims are everyday – all over the planet actually – committing acts of hate, prejudice, bigotry and violence, which well exceed in number and sheer horror any similar acts being perpetrated by any other religion.

And you yourself have admitted that a Christian is obligated to struggle against those things.

So what’s your beef with Robert Spencer and his readers actually struggling against that hate, prejudice, bigotry and violence even though it happens to be being perpetrated by Muslims rather than Christians?

It's fascinating that you dismiss every poster here trying to address the hate, bigotry and violence committed by Muslims every day - their struggle against that - as bigotry, while at the same time conceiving this high moral ground for yourself to struggle against what YOU perceive as hate, prejudice, bigotry and violence committed by Christians in opposing that.

The only difference is that you think you are taking the high moral ground because you are attacking your own rather than “the other”. You have no problem mustering insane bigotry and vitriole against your own and you somehow think that that doesn’t reflect hatred and bigotry because its directed at your own rather than “the other”. You think that gives you the moral high ground.

You’re wrong. Hatred is hatred. Anger is anger. You’re no better than any other poster here. You just think you are better because you’re attacking your own rather than the “other”.

That’s stupid. Sometimes one’s own side is right. Sometimes the other side is right. It requires reason and moral aptitude to tell the difference. You display neither. That makes you the consummate “useful idiot” for championing evil.

We Americans were wrong when we had slaves and we rectified it (that civil war you like to mention as evidence of “Christian violence” without noting what it was fought for). Muslims are wrong NOW for wanting Sharia law to replace liberal democracy.

If this were the 19th century, no doubt many JW posters might well be abolitionists. But that’s history. So RIGHT NOW, Robert Spencer and his readers are focused on confronting what is RIGHT NOW “hate, prejudice, bigotry, and violence” being perpetrated by Muslims on a frightening world-wide scale.

And as you yourself have admitted, it is indeed a Christian’s duty to confront precisely that.

I don't accept your implicit racist assumption (apparent from your vitriole) that only "white Christian Americans" can be bad and truly evil while those "beautiful" (your words) Muslim people can only be good but that's because I'm not a racist, which frankly, I think you are.

There is only evil. It has no color. Or rather it comes in all colors. And Christians are obligated to fight it.

Posted by: Caroline

at August 23, 2007 9:55 PM

Caroline, nice response. This guy seems quite frantic, judging by his storm of comments on PJmedia. I'd guess that there is some serious internal evasion going on. Happy Bunny World just reported a 7.4 earthquake!

Posted by: Brett_McS

at August 23, 2007 10:35 PM

moonzoo, i concur. The fact that Derbyshire does not know the difference between the Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth makes me question his whole understanding of Christianity. It gives the impression that he has only a cursory knowledge of Christian theology, and has not bothered to read or research beyond the surface. I know many self-proclaimed "enlightened" atheist friends, who dismiss religion - and specifically Christianity - as utter rubbish. They make the same mistakes he did. In most cases, when you probe them more deeply, they almost always have a superficial understanding of Christianity, or what they think Christianity is.

Btw, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but does Derbyshire think atheists invented rationality, philosophy, and science?? Someone needs to tell him that atheists didn't come on the scene en masse until the 18th century! (uh, quite a new blip on the radar..) Civilization as we know it, specifically Western thought, was built by men of faith (mostly Christians and Jews) over the past couple of millennia. We should not deny our heritage to conform to an atheist-revisionist history (as is rampant in Europe, and even in America).

Again, just another reason why we need Robert Spencer here!

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 23, 2007 10:43 PM

Brett_McS - I agree. He indeed comes across as quite frantic - hysterical even.

I love the earthquake analogy. The world is literally shifting under the feet of those desperately clinging to their 'modern liberal' (not to be confused with 'classic liberal') ideology.

A fascinating thing to observe, somewhat akin to the impulse to rubber-neck on an accident on the highway.

Posted by: Caroline

at August 23, 2007 10:56 PM

Peaceful_Muslims?-

Actually the last canonical book of the New Testament is entitled: "The Revelation of St. John" (also called "The Apocalypse", or "The Book of Revelations"). St. Cyril, as well as Dionysus, the Bishop of Alexandria, and quite a few other early Church thinkers felt that it was not legitimate and should not be included in the synoptic Bible, but it eventually made the cut.

The first line of it is: "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him [St. John] to show to his servants...", which may be what you are thinking of.

And "rationality" (Logic, Philosophy, etc.) was invented by the pre-Socratics and Socratic Greeks, not the Jews of Christians.

The Greeks created the terms, defined their meanings, and codified their use. ("Logos" is a Greek concept.)

Judeo-Christian thinkers (Spinoza, Aquinas, etc.) based their scholasticism on Plato, Socrates, and most of all Aristotle, the father of rationality.

Although the Hindus also had a parallel, earlier branch of reasoning in their philosophical Yogas (The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, etc.), it's influence in the West -and world in general- has been minimal.

The thinking world didn't begin with the Hebrews and Christians.

Let's hope it doesn't end with the Muslims.

(The film-maker John Huston, a Catholic, once won a huge bet with a guy who thought he knew what "The Immaculate Conception" meant... also mistaking it for "The Virgin Birth".)

Posted by: profitsbeard

at August 23, 2007 11:40 PM

I concur with Traeh. I believe David Mathews is indeed the "rev" Jim Sutter.

Posted by: awake

at August 23, 2007 11:50 PM

Moslems already here, especially after listening to their imams harangues at the mosque, think themselves an invading army for jihad. Derbyshire, who has prejudices against Christianity half understands it; Spencer who holds no such prejudices fully understands it. I hope our intelligence and legal people understand it more like Spencer, since they are our first line of defense against this invasion. Politicians probably see it more or less without real understanding, but this is where jihad has found its chink in the armor, by appealing to our whimpy politicians. To fight this Moslem jihad against us, we need the full power of understanding without prejudices what Islam is all about, and the ways it is trying to insinuate its sharia into our legal system. We cannot let them get to even first base. Who cares about the immaculate conception? Treat Sharia jihad like a disease vector, and act accordingly to squelch it before it really spreads, and then we have a chance. Otherwise, our squabbles here and there, book reviews or otherwise, serve no purpose. Better Islamic jihad is faced with a united front, and despair. Make them back down now, or else there's a war on our hands they will not believe.

Posted by: Battle_of_Tours

at August 24, 2007 12:01 AM

Has anyone else seen the comments from the troll-idiots Zane and David Matthews?

What a load of nonsense. Look at this crap:

"zane :

Infantile, petulant reply Mr Spencer, the truth is as a catholic apologist you have an agenda. Derbyshire wins..HANDS DOWN!"

"David Mathews [TypeKey Profile Page]:

Robert KKK Spencer and his Bigots Brigade ... what a miserable group of hate-filled bigots!

Would Robert Spencer care to argue with Richard Dawkins?

Richard Dawkins says some terrible things about Christianity in his book and lectures. Richard Dawkins also says some really terrible things about the Bible and the various denominations that make up Christianity.

Does Robert Spencer deny that Christians are responsible for a horrendous amount of bloodshed in Europe, the New World and globally throughout the era of colonialism (which happened to end in the global wars of the 20th century)?

Does Robert Spencer deny that there are American bombs & bullets which are killing Iraqi civilians right now?

Does Robert Spencer deny that American Christians (and Jews and atheists) invented the nuclear bomb, and that these weapons were used to kill massive number of civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

****

Fundamentalist Christians are a considerably greater threat to the United States than the Muslims. If you people continue your warmongering I imagine that you people might discover your own religious freedoms restricted.

I am certain that it is just as easy to put bloodthirsty Christian bigots in internment camps as it was to put American citizens of Japanese descent into these camps.

If you people keep spreading your lies and threats of violence against millions of American citizens, I am certain that you will discover that the United States of America is not a Christian fundamentalist any longer.

Do you people really want to put this idea to the test?

The sword of bigoty and religious prejudice cuts both ways."

Posted by: Jonas Salk

at August 24, 2007 12:30 AM

special_guest

The suggestions you made above re: Robert's proposal to classify Muslim groups as political rather than religious organizations is good, but for that to happen, Islam itself needs to be recognized as a geopolitical ideological cult, rather than as a religion. It's hard to rationalize categorizing organizations like CAIR or MPAC as political organizations without recognizing Islam itself to be political. Should one try that, these organizations can credibly point out that they are in fact religious organizations, and that what the government is interpreting as political activity is in fact genuine Islamic religious activity sanctioned by the Quran.

Robert wrote a good article, but on this point, methinks he's putting the chariot before the horses.

Posted by: Infidel Pride

at August 24, 2007 12:35 AM

From troll: Fundamentalist Christians are a considerably greater threat to the United States than the Muslims. If you people continue your warmongering I imagine that you people might discover your own religious freedoms restricted.

The solution is simple: Round up imams teaching political islamic jihad, and close down their mosques. Christianity has nothing to do with this. If moslems want to practice personal faith, fine, but they politicize it, shut it down, deport them. Begone troll, we know what needs doing. And we can do it here, and over there, boundaries no problem.

Posted by: Battle_of_Tours

at August 24, 2007 12:47 AM

Great debate between two very sharp people. Interesting point about the change in immigration laws happening at the time of the decline of Christianity in the US.

Posted by: pez

at August 24, 2007 1:16 AM

Yes, I thought it was great debate too, though -- sorry to be predictable on this -- I thought Spencer got much the better of it. I wonder if Derbyshire will now respond to Spencer. I also thought Spencer's last couple of lines in that piece were kind of brilliant. And I liked hearing the shorthand explanation he used for the difference between Christian and Islamic theology, vis-a-vis science: for Christian theology, God is consistent, whereas in Islamic theology, God is pure will. The former outlook is amenable to science, the latter not, because pure will obeys no laws: Allah obeys nothing but himself. He is absolute potentate, not subject to any laws. The cosmos lacks any strong form of independence from Allah. So for Islam, just as Allah is not subject to any law, so the cosmos is not lawful. It responds only or primarily to Allah's arbitrary will and fiat. But how, without lawfulness, can one birth a science?

Spencer's reference to pure will vs. consistency really boils down the distinction to its essence.

Spencer elsewhere has of course acknowledged the Greco-Roman contribution to our civilization, but I'd like to see him clarify the relative contributions of that heritage compared with the Judeo-Christian one. Maybe no one is clear about that though, since their intertwining goes back to before the beginnings of Christianity.

My understanding of the distinction between what Athens gave us and what Jerusalem gave us is that in certain respects, the Judeo-Christian culture was both more individualistic and more communitarian than the Greco-Roman culture. Ortega y Gasset described the difference by saying that the Greeks, with their intellectual activity and questioning and skepticism, carved out a sort of hole in the plenum of experience, a kind of empty space that didn't impinge on human instinctive responses so directly, leaving human beings psychologically more free than they had been before. Thought does not force one to act. Instinct, on the other hand, and the voices of the gods as well, do compel action, at least in the absence of a capacity for thinking.

Christianity came along and put, into the empty hole the Greeks carved out, something more than a freedom and emptiness born of skepticism. Christinity inserted into that necessary void a positive form of freedom, an ethos based on love. Since love, properly so called, comes from the innermost core of a person, it cannot be compelled. Hence Christianity is profoundly rooted in freedom, and rooted in a profound freedom.

Julian Jaynes put it this way: he said that Christianity was the first religion for conscious human beings. Jaynes held that at some point historically speaking not long prior to the Christian era, the "bicameral mind" broke down and human beings became conscious for the first time. Prior to that, he claims, they had been moved hither and yon, as though in a dream, by the voices of gods, and were in a state that, if I recall correctly, Jaynes analogized to a kind of schizophrenia. That was connected with a different relation between the right and left lobes of the brain, Jaynes hypothesized. Then that connection between right and left hemispheres broke down, and human beings suddenly stopped living in thrall to inner voices and gods, and became conscious and able to think, hence free. For Jaynes, Christianity was in some measure a response to that situation. My hobby horse Rudolf Steiner said that Christ was the divine I AM, the God of the Jews. The Jews themselves had known God through a divine name that meant something like I AM. Christ was the descent into human beings of spiritual individuality, the Logos, and the culmination of eons of evolutionary change, though not of the purely Darwinian kind. It was beyond the tired dichotomy between creationism and evolution. It was evolution as a spiritual, not just a material, process. The way Coleridge understood evolution. But enough off-topic...

Posted by: traeh

at August 24, 2007 3:12 AM

traeh: The fact that "for Christian theology, God is consistent" is (as it relates to Christianity) "the Greco-Roman contribution to our civilization".

It was the influence of Classical Greek rationality that resulted in this cornerstone of Christian theology. A Christian will not explicitly admit it, but, in effect, God is constrained by The Good. The concept of an independent Good is pure Ancient Greek.

Posted by: Brett_McS

at August 24, 2007 3:53 AM

"lagniappe

How cool is that - when I give a customer a "small gift" I normally call it a "un regalito" - and now I find that there is another phrase "la ñapa".

You can learn the most surprising things at JihadWatch ...

Posted by: drk

at August 24, 2007 5:03 AM

While the acts of brutality from Islam are done explicitly, the acts of brutality from Christianity(now that the crusades are over) are done implicitly, through the slow process of politics and our courts. (Danger! Will Robinson, Danger!)

Especially after watching CNN's programs the last 3 nights, our nation should be even more concerned with, not just the potential death from Islam radicals, but the death of our nation from Christian radical fundamentalists.

You owe it to yourself to watch all 6 hours of these programs and see for yourself the disease of the mind when it comes to religion of all forms and the destruction it seeks for its own self-aggrandized rapture.

NO RELIGION OR PEOPLE SHOULD BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY AS PEACE LOVING WHO'S RELIGION TALKS ABOUT THE DEATH AND DESTRUCTION OF PEOPLE THROUGH ARMAGEDDON OR BEING "SAVED" IF YOU JUST BELIEVE IN SOME NON-EXISTENT DEITY.

It doesn't seek peace; it seeks its own dogma through indoctrination, control, manipulation and if given the chance here in the U.S., force, into adherence of "god's laws".

This is sick behavior. This is a disease of the mind.

It is true in our evolution as a species that religion once played its part to help evolve communities toward certain understandings for which we instinctively knew already but laid no words down.

But now religion is used only as a weapon by those who would seek to turn this democracy into a theocracy.

God is imaginary

Prayer is superstitious

Religion poisons everything

Posted by: scooternyc

at August 24, 2007 6:56 AM

I have been enjoying this exchange tremendously. It's rare that I enjoy points from both sides of the debate.

I trust Robert Spencer will not object if I, in my own small manner, make a few comments. Forgive me if I grumble a bit, but I find it best to mention that which I do not agree with, as opposed to the majority that I do agree with:

>>Huh? “And so”? One thing is unbelievable, and so is another, and therefore they’re of equal moral value?

These were my thoughts when reading it. In fact, this is also the position of Sam Harris who keeps pointing out 'we are never going to have problems with Jain suicide bombers'.

>>This cuts both ways: if Christian theocrats are really the threat Chris Hedges, Barry Lynn, and Kevin Phillips think they are, it only plays into the sinister hands of the Bushitler to focus attention on the adherents of the Religion of Peace

Here I would quibble with Mr. Spencer's choice of counterargument. Let's say that there is a nascent totalitarian movement within American Christianity, just for the sake of the argument. Now if we see a mushroom cloud over a major American city, what kind of political forces do Hedges, Phillips, and Lynn think that we will see empowered? What kind of political leaders will rise?

I keep harping on this point to my fellow atheist worrywarts - if there is a Christian Theocracy plot (again, I'm just saying this for the sake of the argument) it becomes vitally important _not_ to let catastrophic terror strike the West, because that would only empower the aforesaid plot.

The expressions on their faces when you mention this are amazing.

BTW, Sam Harris tearing Chris Hedges apart:
http://www.truthdig.com/avbooth/item/20070617_religion_politics_and_the_end_of_the_world/

>>The quip is nice; the thought, shallow. Is it not the case that science, unbounded by any moral sense, leads to dehumanization? (See Aldous Huxley for details.)

After agreeing with a fair bit of Mr. Spencer's writings, I have to take exception to this. Now, one can argue - as Lee Harris does - that for science to get started, it needed to make the a priori assumption that the Universe was an orderly place, which cannot be proved in advance - and that the only way to get that is a kind of mystical supposition, a la Catholicism. Now, that is a heavily debatable point, but even if it is true, today we have tons of evidence that the Universe is an orderly place, and have no more need for mystical claptrap.

This brings me to the second point, about 'science unbounded by any moral sense'. With respect, this is balderdash. Science cannot operate without morality. Science is, by its very nature, moral. In order to be able to work, a scientist must have dedication, he must have total honesty, and he must have justice in order to appreciate those who demonstrate these virutes themselves. And he must have integrity, as well as the deep pride in doing the best one can, as well as the humility in accepting that which he cannot and thus not make any unfounded speculations. These are all cardinal virtues.

Now, I know what you are thinking: the atomic bomb. But nuclear weapons were developed at the behest, not of scientists, but of _governments_. The awful threat of atomic war is the result of what happens if scientists allow others - who may well claim 'faith' as their authority - to proscribe what is and is not moral for them.

There is zero evidence that science dehumanises the scientist. I have met some of the finest minds on this planet, and I can tell you, they are some of the finest human biengs too.

Vis a viz Derbyshire's comments on the nature of christianity, I am afraid that it is still somethin that bothers me. I do not see how fighting against Islam tooth and nail is compatible with 'turning the other cheek' and 'loving the enemy'. I do not love Islam - I hate it. I wish to see it wiped from existence - and I am absolutely convinced that it is moral to do so.

>>They are, of course even more remote from current political reality than mine above, and they spring ultimately from Derbyshire’s lack of belief in the Transcendent: without confidence in the power of truth, there is nothing left but force.

True in part. Whenever human beings renounce the use of reason, force is all that is left. Which is why _all_ faith-based systems have used force.

I am unsure what exactly 'the Transcendent' means. Does this mean belief in the supernatural? But then how does one explain the legions of passionate, dedicated atheists who are willing to fight and die for their values.

I am an atheist and I have a tremendous _confidence_ - not belief - in our species, because of what members of our species are capable of, and what they have routinely demonstrated. We have risen from the swamp and the cave to become creatures capable of seeing the very dawn of the Universe and its end. And that is the root of my hatred of Islam - and of all systems of servilty. Man deserves better than crawling on his belly before some tyrant, whether one on earth, or one invisible in the sky.

Tortured, in the cellars of the Thought Police, Winston Smith speaks of 'some principle that you will never defeat'. He does not believe in God, and the only name that he can give that principle is 'the Spirit of Man'.

We don't _need_ religion to understand that.

>>Al-Masri, of course. But aren’t you stacking the deck here a bit? What if Richard Coeur de Lion were to happen upon this waste-lot rumble? Charlemagne? St. Louis IX? Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Walter Ciszek? Alexander Solzhenitsyn? John Paul II?

A very fair point. I enjoyed that. I don't know about John Paul II, mind you, since he was the one apologising for the Crusades and 'trying to build bridges with Islam'. As Sam Harris has said, there are bridges and there are gangplanks...

The trouble is that Christianity's record of being on the right side of things in this fight - during the Cartoon riots, during the Rushdie affair - is not encouraging. And it was not encouraging against the great totalitarian movements of the twentieth century. That is what worries me.

>>Answer: I’d fight alongside Hitchens in a heartbeat, if he would deign to fight alongside me, which is the real question.

Actually, he would. He has said of the troops fighting in Iraq 'they could all be snake handling congregationists for all I care'.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 24, 2007 7:15 AM

And I will add, Christianity is more deceptive in its madrassah.

Posted by: scooternyc

at August 24, 2007 7:16 AM

scooternyc wrote:

"While the acts of brutality from Islam are done explicitly, the acts of brutality from Christianity(now that the crusades are over) are done implicitly, through the slow process of politics and our courts. (Danger! Will Robinson, Danger!)"

"Especially after watching CNN's programs the last 3 nights, our nation should be even more concerned with, not just the potential death from Islam radicals, but the death of our nation from Christian radical fundamentalists."

My goodness.

The Crusades were defensive in nature. A direct response to years of violent Islamic expansion. Your loose use of the word "brutality", attributing to both what you call the explicit acts of the Islamists and the implicit acts of the Christians respectively, is misplaced. The difference in the degree of the "brutality" could not be any more obvious.

I did watch the entire CNN special and came away laughing at what Amanpour tried to put forth as a moral equivalency amongst the three faiths discussed. I saw interviews with young Christian girls. I saw interviews with conservative Christians expressing their beliefs and some with the desire to overturn Roe v. Wade. I also saw the political movement against gay marriage. In contrast, the night before I saw wave after wave of violence and death in the Islamic world.

Moral equivalency?...I guess some people will truly believe anything.

The "brutality" of the Christians is an organized peaceful political movement. People who express their beliefs and vote for people who share their ideals through the democratic process that is in place in the US. Your fears of the establishment of a Christian theocracy in the US are irrational.

In your words, we should be MORE concerned with the Christian fundamentalists. You speak of a "potential" threat from the Islamists but proceed forward with the death of the entire nation to Christian fundamentalism not as potential, but rather a forgone conclusion unless it is halted. Preposterous.

The atheistic point of view has it's merits, but that position if often taken to a fault. The major flaw is that the atheists tend to ignore the immediate imminent threat posed by Islam, as you just did, but yet somehow expect a reasonable solution is for 85% of the world's population to abandon faith altogether.

My, my, that is quite a lofty goal.

Let's compare gay marriage being prohibited in the US, as it currently is, to gay marriage being prohibited under Islamic Sharia law. Do you think the degree of "brutality" is similar, or do you maintain that it will actually be worse under a Christian theocracy?

Rarely, if ever, have I encountered someone who's need to read Robert's new book is more dire than your own.

Posted by: awake

at August 24, 2007 9:02 AM

Sorry, Fanusi. Christianity was not encrouaging against the totalitarian movements of the 20th century? You never heard of the Confessing movement in the German churches? The general abhorrence in which Christians held Communism (after all, Marx declared Christianity an opiate). The Reformed churches never got along with the totalist claims of either kings or party presidia.

And, you prick the Christian conscience in the eighteenth century and get Wilberforce's crusade to end slavery in Britain and dominions; you prick the Islamic conscience in the same time, and you get Mulay Isamail's declaration that he cannot tamper with the place God assigned for unbelievers.

Also, we Christians do have a tradition of thinking that speaks of the "just war". Christ's admonition to abstain from personal cengeance does not de-canonize David's example as a warrior. It's just that we see war as the absolute last resort, not the great religious duty of the pious man.

Finally, as a Christian, I find the doctrine of the immaculate conception (the idea that Mary was conceived without original sin) to be the drivellings of a deluded, 19th century Italian Prince. In Scripture itself, Mary confesses herself to be in need of a savior along with the rest of us sinners (Luke 2, in the Magnificat). Also, the one in whom all Israel is represented in a single person is Jesus, not Mary (it is written, "Out of Egypt I called my son"--Mt. 2, quoting Hosea--not "my daughter").

Posted by: Kepha

at August 24, 2007 9:04 AM

Scooternyc, if I didn't know better, I might think that Mr. Spencer pays people like you to come on here and make silly posts just to prove his points. Crack open a history book. The West is becoming less Christian and more secular over time (which is generally a good thing in my view.) These Christian fundamentalist leaders, of which you seem to be so terrified, do not command militias or terrorist cells. They are really only successful in limited parts of the US and Canada, and even then, the only things they are really accomplishing is to con 'donations' from the pensions of the elderly, which they then use to build lavish swimming pools and air conditioned dog houses, and to furthermore convince these same people to vote for Pat Buchanan, thereby subtracting votes from whomever may be the Republican front runner in a particular presidential election year. These shouldn't really be seen as paramount issues of national or global concern to any sane person, especially when compared to things like global warming, oil dependence, or Islamic expansionism and militancy.

Posted by: Abu Allah

at August 24, 2007 9:11 AM

Posted by: John C at August 23, 2007 8:30 PM

There's no difference, John.

It is the same symbolical origin and the same wish to testify the "special origine" of Jesus.

You can take some other examples to it (and please don't send me to google for all the examples)

In the ancient sumerian, babylonian, greek etc. mythologies you will find the complex of being born out of a seed, getting again into the earth (sacrifice of Jesus) and get born again.

You also find the birth of Athene, the Birth of the first People, Birth out of miraculous egg a.s.o. Would you want to start and argue with those other mythologies, that human beings won't get born out of eggs? Or would you start studying the symbolic meanings in those myths?

I am just saying, that this kind of aproach to a literary or mythological text is very naiv, dilettantic - and cannot give any revelance about the real value either of the islam or of christian mythology

Posted by: Kybeline

at August 24, 2007 9:13 AM

traeh: I enjoyed your post, timed at 3:12AM.

Have you read Sailing From Byzantium by Colin Wells? In its own way, SFB is as useful as Robert Spencer's books in understanding why we are where we are. It is also a delightful book to read. It is not a polemical work whatsoever, but its history (besides being fascinating and so well written) is very instructive (or am I being redundant? ... lol).

I think Wells' book would be of particular interest to anyone who visits JW.

Posted by: Moonzoo

at August 24, 2007 9:48 AM

Thorough, well-argued and impeccably polite. It is responses such as this that makes Robert Spencer apply to godless Brits such as me.

Posted by: Aveyard

at August 24, 2007 10:02 AM

What a sharp contrast in these writings!

The tools of John Derbyshires' trade appear limited to words.

The tools of Robert's trade include both words and ideas.

Well done, Robert.

Posted by: LoneRanger

at August 24, 2007 10:08 AM

Looking at discussion above, I think that I should say something to those who think that America is uniquely threatened by radical Christians. Look at this! http://www.ianpaisley.org/toc.asp?loc=politics This man is the First Minister of Northern Ireland. That means that he is the most powerful man in one of the four states of the U.K. That is more powerful than the Governor of Texas. What do you all think of his views?

I have heard that four abortion doctors have been killed by the terrorist group, the Army of God. That is terrible. In Britain, thirteen prostitutes were killed by a radical Christian - Paul Sutcliffe.

No-one expects that Britain is going to become a Christian theocracy. No-one should expect that America will do neither. We are not really any more threatened that you are, and we do not talk about this "threat" ever. Islam is a much bigger threat than Christianity.

Posted by: Aveyard

at August 24, 2007 10:09 AM

Moslems are a sleezy lot, they lie. Under oath? To what, Allah? which means what? Look at Islamic history and their unholy texts. I vote for Spencer's analysis to tell the truth. Christianity is not the problem. Islam is the problem, had been for 1400 years, and is once more spreading like disease. Christianity is not its main opposition, nor should it be used to combat this plague. The correct approach is to identify the carriers of this unholy mission of totalitarian world domination, hiding under the guise of 'religiion' and stop them. Our freedoms demand no less.

Posted by: Battle_of_Tours

at August 24, 2007 10:11 AM

scooternyc,

I have the same disgust for millenarian apocalyptic notions, but that is a rather small and peculiarly "American" part of Christianity; and not the core of it, not in numbers or doctrine.

Christians waiting for Armageddon to cleanse the world engage in a rather passive excercise. They are a disengaged subculture [IMO--I'm not trying to antagonize anyone] that lacks the imperative to dominate all and everything driving Islam. Most of all, they lack the political entities, institutions, and machinery--not to mention the collective WILL and shear numbers--that make Dar al-Islam the greatest, most immediate and existential threat to our nation and globe.

That God is distinct from, and beyond creation doesn't necessarily make Him imaginary, just hard to define by unaided huma n reason alone--not even considering how knowable He is as a Person.

Scooter, ignoring the smug, exclusive certitude of their own right standing in God's eyes of some Christians (a characteristic of many Muslims also), let's focus on the REAL threat [manifested in death fatwas, ultimatums, and declarations of war] (to our freedoms, well-being, our very lives) of ISLAM.

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 11:40 AM

Brett,

God is Himself the Good--He is consistently true to Himself.

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 12:14 PM

>>Sorry, Fanusi. Christianity was not encrouaging against the totalitarian movements of the 20th century? You never heard of the Confessing movement in the German churches?

Actually, no, I haven't. However, I have heard of a few things like this:

>>Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith ...we need believing people.

- Adolf Hitler, April 26, 1933, speech made during negotiations leading to the Nazi-Vatican Concordant

And so on. I know that Hitler was blessed by the Vatican, as well as enjoying large scale support from the protestant churches. Other fascist regimes enjoyed similar support.

When it comes to Communism, Russian Christianity essentially laid the groundwork for Stalin and his horrors, by hammering faith and servitude into the peasants for centuries. Not to mention Stalin making up with the Russian Orthodox church and the Vatican later on (read Animal Farm).

So you can call that 'aiding' or 'spectacularly failing to resist'. Either way the track record stinks.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 24, 2007 12:34 PM

>>And, you prick the Christian conscience in the eighteenth century and get Wilberforce's crusade to end slavery in Britain and dominions;

Which, by the way, was opposed just as intensely by other Christians and those other Christians cited chapter and verse of the Bible to back themselves up. Slavery _is_ sanctioned in the Bible.

I'll just throw Christopher Hitchens's bet out here: Can you think of a single moral action performed or a single wise thing said by a believer that could not have been done or said by a nonbeliever?

Conversely, can you imagine an atrocity committed or nonsense believed that specifically requires religious faith and is impossible to unbelievers?

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 24, 2007 12:43 PM

Kybeline,

It doesn't matter to me here what mythic pagan roots the Christian narrative has. Mythic thought is an engaging subject; yes, but my focus is not on that or on the believability of dogmas, so much.

I try to clarify what we mean by "immaculate conception" in the interest of mutual understanding and respect--useful to our common stand against the jihad imperative of Islam.

As Peaceful, Kepha, and others know, "immaculate conception" is an entirely different matter from that of "virgin birth." "Immaculate conception" doesn't refer to Christ's conception or to biology at all.

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 12:45 PM

Caroline: Excellent writing. FYI, "Dave Mathews" has been banned from quite a few sites that I visit regularly. He's a very active troll. (FWIW, I think I qualify as a "classical liberal", which of late has been pretty close to "Goldwater Republican". I'm too young to have voted for Barry, but IMHO we should have had him as POTUS.)

Quoth Im.mad.as.HELL!:

If what you propose were true why hasn't this happen in the last 200 years of our countries life.

The people who would do it didn't have the influence to stack the Supreme Court before. The SC is one vote away from allowing overt sectarian bias in government. This is one of their explicit goals.

The church/state barrier is under attack but by those that wish to remove any thought, value or control (I speak in terms of the positive) that Christian values have influenced this country.

Now you're repeating theocrat talking points, and using the same "tu quoque" attacks as the Islamists. Ending sectarian prayer at public school events or removing Biblical displays and pictures of Jesus from court houses are not an attack on either Christianity or separation. They only prevent government from endorsing one religion (or one sect of one religion) over others. You will find NO CASE where prayer in a church or home, or a creche on private property, has ever been successfully challenged under the First Amendment.

I don't think demoting Islam as a religion and outlawing it is a threat to the first amendment rather it is a way of protecting it from an enemy that would nullify it given the chance.

If we let Christians perform sectarian meddling in politics, we make impossible to forbid Islamists from doing the same. Christianity does just fine with separation, while Islam cannot abide it. Lowering that barrier ultimately serves the Islamists.

Quoth venividivici:

The threat from Islam is a threat to both faith AND reason

Fundamentalism of any kind is a threat to reason, and heightening the barriers between unreason and government authority is one sure way to reduce the chances of any kind of theocracy.

I'm all for recognizing Islam in general as a political movement, with all that implies. But that doesn't mean that I'm willing to accept e.g. fundamentalist Christian censorship of biology teaching (which they already do de facto and are attempting to do de jure) as the price of fighting the Islamists, and I will not cede any ground on that front for the sake of another.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 12:58 PM

Conversely, can you imagine an atrocity committed or nonsense believed that specifically requires religious faith and is impossible to unbelievers? - Fanusi Khiyal

SLAVERY, total submission.

We who are free may be religious or unreligious in how we reject slavery. Slaves are not free to reject their condition.

Those who submit to religious authority must obey as 'slaves' of Allah, or other gods of the Sharia.

Free human beings cannot tolerate the atrocity of human slavery, where any human being is owned by another. We reject total submission to slavery, which a 'slave of Allah' is not free to do by his religious faith.

Posted by: Battle_of_Tours

at August 24, 2007 1:01 PM

Quoth John C:

If theocratic Christians are marginal, and there is no consensus (nor likely emerging) among Christians for theocracy (apart from legitimate engagement with the world)

It doesn't matter. By the time it got to the point where a lack of consensus stopped their progress, a huge amount of damage would have been done.

how does that compare with the large and growing numbers of Muslims seeking a restored Caliphate, imposition of Sharia, and Muslim supremacy achieved by whatever means, even bin Laden's?

They are two different things. The Islamic program is far worse, but it is alien; the Christian theocratic program co-opts far more people and has greater potential to effect harmful change at the level of the law.

Enlightenment values or not, we have to hang together, not separately. There are so many fronts of this existential struggle, resistance requires everyone of us.

Agreed. This is why I'd like Robert to do two things:

Stop alienating Enlightment adherents by dismissing the threat posed by Christian theocrats.
Recognize the threat posed to both the Enlightenment and Christianity by lowering the barriers between religion and civil law.

The barriers have already come down too far with the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives. It is not hard to imagine certain front-running candidates deciding to put Ibrahim Hooper in charge of that office for "outreach". This way lies madness. I'd much prefer Robert to place himself firmly on the safe site of the issue.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 1:05 PM

Quoth waltc:

Alchemy was a spiritual science not materials engineering.

"Spiritual science" is an oxymoron, and you utterly missed the point: alchemy midwifed chemistry, but that does not mean it merits respect today.

And where are the hordes of astrologers that have impeded the nerds of science?

They're out there in voting booths, electing politicians who know as little of science as they do and direct budgets accordingly.

But if a Christian says abortion is wrong call out the police and hide the leftists with slight constitutions.

They do not merely call it wrong, they call for it to be banned by the power of the state (and pass numerous laws to that effect). This is taking an article of faith (that an organism with no identifiable mental function or other high-level human traits is a human being) and demanding that it be obeyed by all. Why can't they agree to disagree and follow their own path? Isn't this demand for state imposition of religious dogma upon non-believers exactly the thing we condemn Islamists for?

As far as the west becoming a Christian state, it only exists in the deluded minds of leftists who don't have a clue.

You don't see the attack on reproductive rights (including the denial of OTC sales of Plan B), the attack on science teaching (including but not limited to evolution), and other "social" things as I do. Christians who believe these things are wrong are free to differ, but they are trying to use the power of the state to force their dogma onto the unwilling or captive audiences.

Isn't this exactly the thing we condemn Islamists for?

If anything it will be the leftists who usher in theocratic Europe that takes its orders from Mecca.

And in the USA it will be self-styled Christians who will tear down the wall between church and state and allow the Islamists to march over the rubble.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 1:07 PM

--POSTED BY FANUSI

Jesus told me to love my enemies. He didn't tell me to love HIS enemies.

I am truly the enemy of Jesus' enemies. And Jesus' greatest enemy is Satan, the anti-Christ, of whom muhammad was one incarnation and the worst incarnation, "a liar and the father of lies, and a murderer from the beginning."

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2

at August 24, 2007 1:11 PM

John C.,

While I share you courage of facing the Islamic religion and its violence toward Americans, it cannot be ignored that watching the Evangelical movement in this nation is disturbing.

If, as from the words of the people who were interviewed last night, it is there "goal" to turn the democracy into a theocracy, then I'm sorry to say, we have a fight on our hands both at home and abroad. Christians just haven't started strapping on bombs...yet.

Why is it that the religious feel ownership in trying to convert people into their dogma? It's not theirs to own. YOU DON'T OWN OTHER PEOPLE.

Why is it their "right" to impose their dogma on our nation?

No religious person gets their morals from their religious text except those morals which seek to bestow bigotry and hatred toward others in society they see as "less than" themselves.

This "belief" is in and of itself, distorted.

Any candidate who utilizes religion as part of his/her platform has then eliminated a great majority of Americans

Being here is about Freedom, Democracy, and ALL people living together and being represented, not just a fringe group hellbent on meeting their maker come Armageddon.

I always like to say to anyone who thinks there's a better life after this one: why don't you get on your bike and get going then, what are you waitin' around here for - if you want to end your life, fine, but don't take anyone with you who isn't willing to go.

Posted by: scooternyc

at August 24, 2007 1:12 PM

No religious person gets their morals from their religious text except those morals which seek to bestow bigotry and hatred toward others in society they see as "less than" themselves.

Posted by: scooternyc

Son, you are a COMPLETE AND TOTAL IGNORAMUS!

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2

at August 24, 2007 1:17 PM

Brett_McS, you said:

The concept of an independent Good is pure Ancient Greek.

Can you give a hint or two as to how you come to that conclusion? Ok, the Platonic Good and so on. But a hint about how you got to the conclusion that "consistency" and an "independent Good" derive exclusively or even primarily from the ancient Greeks, and not at all from the Judeo-Christian tradition. The things is, along with the notable differences between them, Christ and Socrates have many things in common. One thing they have in common, seems to me, is the notion of an independent Good. What about where Christ says things like "I come not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me," and things in a similar vein. Or "My Kingdom is not of this world." Aren't those statements based on a notion of an independent Good? Furthermore, the monotheism of the Jews, which Christianity to a great extent inherits, surely also supports a notion of an independent Good, perhaps even more than the Greeks supported it. Couldn't one fairly argue that Judaic monotheism saw God, and the Good, as more "transcendent," more "other," more "independent" than did the ancient Greeks?

Moonzoo, you said:

Have you read Sailing From Byzantium by Colin Wells?

No, but I'll look for it.

Posted by: traeh

at August 24, 2007 1:44 PM

scooternyc wrote:

"Any candidate who utilizes religion as part of his/her platform has then eliminated a great majority of Americans."

A great majority? You can of course back that up with.....?

Posted by: awake

at August 24, 2007 1:57 PM

Believers are notoriously bigoted against atheists. AFAIK nobody has ever won national office while running as an atheist, and there is only one atheist in Congress who is "out".

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 2:10 PM

E-P,

We had a lengthy discussion on this awhile back which I do not wish to re-hash. I have not chimed in on your posts for good reason. I do not entirely disagree with your assessment.

I disagree with scooternyc's assessment that a Christian theocracy is inevitable and should be considered more dangerous that Islam. I do not think you share the same sentiment as scooternyc in this regard, or at least I am hoping that you don't. Sccoter misspoke again when stating that in an overwhelmingly Christian country, a candidate that runs on faith will eliminate a "great majority" of Americans.

I, for one, think issues should be proritized and addressed on the degree of their liklihood and the subsequent danger that they pose. In my mind, there is absolutely no debate to which presents a more imminent threat when discussing Christianity and Islam.

I am all but certain that even in the event that a Christian theocracy is established in the US, (which I do not believe is likely at all), that the Christian "oppression" against atheists would pale in comparison to the other alternative.

Since the abandonment of a divine faith en masse is not feasible, another solution must be sought. I absolutely agree that the clearly defined separation of church and state must be maintained, as originally intended. You must admit however, that the current state of the US, adulterated by leftist, anti-Christian sentiment coupled with the sustaining vehicle of PC, has and will continue to do irreparable damage to this country.

I use the European model in this regard. Clearly, the abandonment of Christian principles, coupled with liberal socialist governing and suicidal fertility rates are the main culprits that has placed Europe in the dire situation it now resides in. The Islamic threat is deeply entrenched in Europe currently.

Many Christian believers are definately bigoted against atheists. The divine mandates in Islam do not offer any shelter for the atheist, however. I am a nominal Catholic and am not one who holds disdain for atheism at all. For me, it boils down to a simple analogous concept:

If I have a leaky faucett in the bathroom, is the time to address that before or after I put out the fire in my kitchen?

Regards,

awake

Posted by: awake

at August 24, 2007 2:43 PM

Believers are notoriously bigoted against atheists. AFAIK nobody has ever won national office while running as an atheist, and there is only one atheist in Congress who is "out".
Posted by: Engineer-Poet at August 24, 2007 2:10 PM

While it may be true that most will not vote for an Atheist, I believe it has more to do with their politics than religion (since most are way too Liberal for the majority of the country).

Before you even go the 'religious' route with me, I'm Atheist.

Posted by: Miss_Anthrope

at August 24, 2007 3:07 PM

Given that overt piety is practically a litmus test for getting a Republican nomination, it's not surprising that atheists in politics are on the liberal side of the spectrum.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 3:39 PM

Profitsbeard-

Yes, The Revelation of St.John, which is, as you mention, the revelation of Jesus Christ. I just find it amusing that people who don't know the Bible refer to it as "Revelations." ooo aaah

Certainly there was debate about various books of the Bible for many years before the canon was fixed. "The Apocalypse" since that time, has always been fixed as part of the official church canon however.

Yes, you're correct the Logos is a Greek idea incorporated by St.Paul into Christian theology. That is why I said "men of faith" rather than simply Christians and Jews, b/c certain aspects of the "thinking world" as you say, began with the Greeks before the Hebrews and Christians. Yet, even the Greeks believed in "gods." Going all the way back to the Sumerians, we find gods. Never atheism. There were no atheists per se at that time, not until much, much later. The evolution of western thought then for the most part has been built upon faith-filled thinkers..

But, as Mr.Spencer points out, no where else in the world did modern civilization blossom than like it did in Europe. I would be willing to take anyone's wager that this is a fact b/c of our Judeo-Christian heritage, and not b/c of differences in "production," or "geography," or "biology" as Derbyshire suggests... Yes, these other aspects played a part, but the underlying, driving force was the West's philosophical outlook (ie, our Judeo-Christian foundation).

Now, as a committed secularist myself, I agree there should be separation of Church and State. And, no matter what are differences are, we must unite ourselves together to defeat the common threat of Islamo-fascists - who wish to destroy us!

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 24, 2007 4:32 PM

scooternyc,

You realize, of course, Islam's jihad takes many forms. Not only explicit, but also implicit as well--jihadists exploit our differences to foster social division, further Islamic social penetration, discredit Western thought and tradition in all its variety, and weaken our resistance to external threats. And jihadists of every stripe share common goals and beliefs, put aside their internal enmities long enough to make common cause against us, and work in concert--the subtle efforts of "soft" jihadists complement the overt acts of "hard" jihadists quite effectively.

Compared to expansionist Islam and its virus-like replication, in the game of global domination, triumphalist this-world Christianity is a piker--just compare the arsenals of each, respectively. Also note that, in the comments posted and the articles discussed above, there is no unanimity about whether Christianity is a Lion, or a Lamb (or rather pussycat).

But I agree, NO THEOCRACY HERE. (I mean, no clerical government, established church, or clerical-administered law. That's not the same thing as espousing religion or upholding beneficial social values.)

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 5:28 PM

What I have always admired in Robert's writings is the fact that he never 'overstretches' or bites more that he can chew. I haven't been here for long, only since the Danish cartoons, but that is as much as I can say.

Sticking with the sources and what they prove and not trying to provide a comprehensive explanation of life, universe and everything is a skill that very few intellectuals actually master. Most intellectuals don't have the humility for that.

As for Mr. Derbyshire, I see him as a typical secularist in a sense that for him all religions and their "magic content" are the same. For the likes of him it does not matter what the religions actually teach and what kind of moral values they promote. They are bad because they are religions and promote superstition instead of rational thought. According to Richard Dawkins, it was religion that caused 9/11 not jihad. And I think that Robert is trying to prove with his new book that you cannot make such a generalization.

Posted by: Saatanan Islam

at August 24, 2007 6:25 PM

If a shark can do it, can it be impossible for God?

Captive shark had 'virgin birth'

The bonnethead is a species in the hammerhead group
Female hammerhead sharks can reproduce without having sex, scientists confirm.

The evidence comes from a shark at Henry Doorly Zoo in Nebraska which gave birth to a pup in 2001 despite having had no contact with a male.

Genetic tests by a team from Belfast, Nebraska and Florida prove conclusively the young animal possessed no paternal DNA, Biology Letters journal reports.

The type of reproduction exhibited had been seen before in bony fish but never in cartilaginous fish such as sharks.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6681793.stm

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2

at August 24, 2007 6:34 PM

IMO, scooter,

If Christians start stapping-on bombs (as you dread), it will be in defense of atheists, Jews, fellow human beings--"Deliver those being led away to the slaughter" and "No greater love has a man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends" and all that. If there was no other alternative, and for the intention of saving innocents in imminent peril, not for the intention to kill self or others; and then only for a proportionally greater good.

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 7:26 PM

Sorry, read "proportionATELY greater good."

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 7:31 PM

“I'll just throw Christopher Hitchens's bet out here: Can you think of a single moral action performed or a single wise thing said by a believer that could not have been done or said by a nonbeliever?”

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal at August 24, 2007 12:43 PM

When you refer to “moral action” or “ a wise thing said” in that bet, what is your criteria for defining “moral”? Or “wise”? (I suppose one could lump them together as “the Good”). Because obviously Muslims define “moral” and “wise” as “whatever Muhammad did”. Christians likewise generally define “moral” and “wise” in reference to Jesus’s behavior. The reason I am curious as to how you determine that something is moral or wise is because the bet presupposes that there is already some implicit agreement among people as to what constitutes morality and wisdom.

Is the atheist position that “the Good” is somehow self-evident? I am interested in understanding how morality and wisdon is self-evident to the atheist. If anything, I would imagine that an atheist could well subscribe to a social Darwinian POV. What would prevent an atheist from considering social Darwinism as “good” and “wise”? (Sorry – I’m not well learned in atheistic arguments so I ask this question with genuine curiosity and the question doesn't seem to be entirely unrelated to the topic of the thread.)

Posted by: Caroline

at August 24, 2007 9:58 PM

Just contributing a few more thoughts to the current discussion concerning the relationship between reason and faith, philosophy and religion, in 'the West'.

To traeh - you make a good point re the possibility that Judaic monotheism saw God, and the Good, as more "transcendent," more "other," more "independent" than did the ancient Greeks?". Indeed it did. I have mentioned David Bentley Hart, "The Beauty of the Infinite", more than once in discussions of this kind. In this connection I cannot recommend it to you, Traeh, too strongly - see Part 1, section 4, 'The Covenant of Light' for Hart's discussion of the limits of the insight available to pagan Greek philosophers, when considered over against the Biblical revelation.

More generally: for any Christian here who feels daunted by the prospect of the enormous spiritual and physical struggle against jihad and daawa and against the widespread Western denial of both dangers, Hart's book is a wonderful source of refreshment, encouragement and clarity. I plan, indeed, to re-read it as a companion piece to Spencer's latest. I am sure I will find many thought-provoking congruences.

Even secularists and atheists might find some interest in Part One of 'The Beauty of the Infinite', where Hart examines in detail - and demolishes - the postmodern philosophy of persons such as Deleuze, Foucault and Levinas, whilst also delivering a resounding broadside to Heidegger and Nietzsche. Be warned - it's tough going - I think even Hugh would need a dictionary occasionally.

Hart never mentions Islam - yet much of that first section can be profitably read not only as a response to postmodernism but as a rejoinder to the metaphysics and theology of Islam. After I had read it I understood why so many French intellectuals, in the mid-20th century, converted to Islam. Their philosophy had 'primed' them for it. Which may also account for the massive trahison des clercs - active support, or acquiescence, or wilful blindness - which we are seeing everywhere the West, as regards Islam.

After all - Islam's allah who is beyond good and evil, absolute Power, absolute Will, totally arbitrary, has a distinct affinity with the Nietzschean worldview...

Not in this discussion, but in another discussion on JW or DW someone observed that Islam could be defined as a 'monotheistic paganism'. Everything Hart says about the purely pagan worldview supports that observation.

PS: A sidelight on 'atheism' -

How many people know that the early Christians in the Roman empire were sometimes accused of being 'atheists'? Alain Besancon: "We modern Christians tend to regard atheism as the alternative to faith. But that was not the case in the ancient world, which accused the Christians of atheism because they refused to affirm the existence of the gods."

And, as for the Jews: when the Roman general, after the final Jewish resistance in Jerusalem had been crushed, shoved aside the curtain and barged into the Holy of Holies to seize the Jewish god for the Triumphal procession in Rome...imagine his consternation upon discovering - nothing. Candlesticks, table, the adoring cherubim, all the usual furniture and decorations of a sanctuary - but ...in the place where throughout the entire known world he would have expected to find a central and dominating divine image, painted, carved, gilded, wood or stone or metal - NOTHING. I sometimes wonder whether, as he stood in that silence and that emptiness, he didn't feel the hairs standing up on the back of his neck.

Posted by: dumbledoresarmy

at August 24, 2007 10:52 PM

[Obstacles prevent me from posting in a timely and relevant way]

Kepha,

I know where you stand, and as a Christian also, in the interest of mutual understanding and respect, let me say this, that your characterization of Pope Pius IX is uncharitable and unnecessary, and that the articulation of belief in Mary's being immaculately conceived predates Pius' dogmatic definition of it [in 1854] by centuries.

Hosea was alluding most directly to Jacob, called Israel, as the progenitor of his people. Yes, in this, God the Father is pointing to God the Son.

However, I call your attention to the Woman in the Book of Revelation who is clearly an allegory of Israel (and by parallel, the Church). An allegory, yes, but the image is of a human being, not a goddess; and she (Israel) bore a male child destined to rule all the nations, who is clearly Jesus Christ. But the collective wombs of Israel didn't bear the Messiah; rather, Israel delivered the Savior, Jesus, in the person of Mary. Moreover, Jesus' Person is Divine, but He took His human nature from Mary. I may justly, then, identify the Woman in Revelation with Mary.

Mary certainly has the same Savior as the rest of us, but she is saved in a more excellent way than we are. The New Adam created a new Eve; the Lamb Who was slain from the foundation of the world chose His own mother and predestined her when He created her. By the infinite merits of her Son, God saves her, by prevenient grace, from falling into the pit that snared Eve. And Jesus, in His Divine Person, assumes His Divine humanity, preserved untainted, from Mary. He takes His humanity from her, but everything she is derives from Him.

Posted by: John C

at August 24, 2007 11:16 PM

Caroline, atheism is merely a definition of what a philosophy does not have. Buddhists don't believe in deities as such, and can be considered to adhere to an atheistic (but quite mystic) philosophy. Secular humanism is atheistic. Pure utilitarianism and Objectivism, ditto. Lots of social Darwinists were nominal Christians, so that's no helpful distinction.

I'm not a scholar of philosophies (just a freethinker who believes that what a morality prescribes and proscribes is more important than its putative source), so I can't tell you much more. But I had to try to clear that bit up.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 24, 2007 11:23 PM

Engineer-poet: "Secular humanism is atheistic"

I don't really buy that. I think secular humanists are just watered down "nominal Christians". I still think they derive their essential moral compass from Christianity, even as they've supposedly discarded the need for it. As to utilitarianism, objectivism and "nominal Christian" social darwinists - yikes - I'm no scholar of philosophies either! Got me there (in terms of the origin of their ethics as it relates to Hitchens' bet.)

As to Buddhism, however, (and setting aside Zen Buddhism which may be a unique case), Orthodox Buddhism refers to the "8 noble truths", described here :

http://www.thebigview.com/buddhism/eightfoldpath.html

which for the believer in Buddhism define what is moral and wise (and conversely immoral and unwise). For example, desire is bad, lying is bad, theft is bad and so on.

So Orthodox Buddhists still have a laid out prescription for what constitutes moral action and wisdom which is grounded in their religion. They have something which they consult and which they believe to be true which tells them what is moral and wise. In short, they are "believers" (even if not monotheists). Their reference for the good and wise is the actions and sayings of the founder of their religion.

That would seem to me to exclude them from Hitchens' bet (this may be a paraphrase by the poster - I don't know since there's no link to the orignal source)- "Can you think of a single moral action performed or a single wise thing said by a believer that could not have been done or said by a nonbeliever?”

Posted by: Caroline

at August 24, 2007 11:53 PM

The respectful(mostly) and intellectual level of discourse here at JW/DW is outstanding, in my opinion. It certainly is not what drew me to Robert and Co.'s site, but it certainly keeps me here and distinguishes it from most others I have visited.

Robert's scholarship on the subject of Islam is superior to all others that I have encountered and beyond reproach as far as I am concerned. But each day I retire, a thankful man. Thankful for the free access to the broad breadth of knowlege on a wide variety of sub-topics regularly displayed here.

In the modern internet age, this reality is anything but commonplace.

Posted by: awake

at August 25, 2007 12:45 AM

Engineer-poet - sorry, must have had a senior moment. Buddhism doesn't strike me as incompatible with the theoretical existence of God but it certainly doesn't require the belief either. So that certainly does appear to make Hitchens point. (Although having been raised a Christian, I suspect I somehow use Christianity as a reference point for recognizing or evaluating that Buddhism does in fact promote "the Good").

Posted by: Caroline

at August 25, 2007 5:18 AM

>>I would imagine that an atheist could well subscribe to a social Darwinian POV.

You would imagine, and you would be wrong. I am sorry if this sounds short, but I am fed to the teeth hearing from the religious that atheists have no moral compass because they have no celestial bullyboy to terrify them into line, especially given the apalling track record of religion in this field.

To answer your question, I am an Objectivist, and as such understand that morality is not a matter of mystical revelation or divine whim _but is rooted in the objective requirements for human life_. Justice, Integrity, Productiveness, Rationality, Courage, Honesty... these are all absolute requirements for human life.

And these are recognised as moral actions around the world - in fact, rudiments of these exist even in nonhuman species. Human beings tend only to turn against these in toto when they are completely deranged by a transformative fantasy - which is often religious.

In short, something that we would both recognise as a moral action. You don't necessarily need to know why something is moral or immoral in order to recognise it as such. Since long in our pre-human past, we have been able to recognise colours, but only recently are we able to understand why a colour is a colour. Similarly, because the above mentioned virtues are fundamental requirements of human life, they appear to be found in rudimentary form across the world.

>>I still think they derive their essential moral compass from Christianity, even as they've supposedly discarded the need for it.

Simply wrong. Humanisms roots do not go back to the life-hating teachings of Christ, but the life-affirming teachings of ancient Greece and Rome. The idea is not to live for some mystic dream beyond the grave, but here and now, for real, in reality, on this earth. "Watered-down nominal Christians" my foot.

Perhaps I am being dense here, but I fail to see how an atheist could not follow the eightfold path of Buddhism especially since the original Buddhism - Theravada - is atheistic and Buddha is only a human teacher, _not_ a god, as the Mahayana insist on making him.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 25, 2007 5:29 AM

scooternyc,

Re: "If Christians start st[r]apping-on bombs ...

For a time there I wondered what, for God's sake, was I was talking about?--then I thought of a concrete example:

Did you ever hear about someone named Colonel Claus Count Von Stauffenberg?

Posted by: John C

at August 25, 2007 6:38 AM

Fanusi - If you read my original post, I said "The reason I am curious as to how you determine that something is moral or wise is because [Hitchens] bet presupposes that there is already some implicit agreement among people as to what constitutes morality and wisdom. Is the atheist position that “the Good” is somehow self-evident?"

I wasn't attacking atheism as your somewhat defensive response seems to imply. But you have in fact answered my question when you say, " You don't necessarily need to know why something is moral or immoral in order to recognise it as such."

So your position appears to be that it's self-evident.

(BTW - With regard to the Romans, shouldn't it have been self-evident that feeding Christians to the lions was immoral?)

Buddhism is an interesting case because Buddha's teachings were based on Buddha's direct experience of enlightenment. So to some extent, unless someone has directly experienced enlightenment themselves, they are accepting Buddha's authority on the matter. Is what the Buddha taught self-evident? Is it, for example, self-evident that desire always leads to suffering? Or that killing even a spider is wrong? Is radical pacifism self-evident as a moral system?

(BTW I wasn’t trying to be confrontational with the questions I asked. I was just musing. I’m not as religious as you appear to think.)

Posted by: Caroline

at August 25, 2007 7:37 AM

Fascist trolls end up doing this to our cause:

Sonic Wall Has Been Censoring Foehammer’s Anvil as ‘Pornography’

So, it's a bigger threat than it first appears. We're still actively investigating how deep the problem for my blog goes, but I won't be shocked to find that the Anvil is included in even more censoring software packages from other companies.

Everyone that runs a blog that stands up for anything they believe in needs to be concerned by this kind of behavior on the part of 3rd party program developers.

Next stop, Communism?

Posted by: Foehammer

at August 25, 2007 8:21 AM

at the risk of getting slightly Off-Topic from the JW website, Fanusi stated "Justice, Integrity, Productiveness, Rationality, Courage, Honesty... these are all absolute requirements for human life."

Well, sort-of. In an atheistic world-view, there is no "right" or "wrong," no absolutes. Why would the above attributes be "absolute requirements" for human life if there are no ultimate consequences for our actions? Ultimately from this worldview, if after we die there is nothing, then our actions are without consequence. We have no absolute requirement to live a certain way. There is no way to say this action is objectively "right" and that action is objectively "wrong." You may do so out of social empathy, or feelings of goodness towards humanity, but there is no ultimate purpose for doing so. We're all just dust.

Caroline makes an excellent point. "Self-evident" truths can be a scary thing. Are the Muslims who practice "honor killings" good or bad, by your definition? It is self-evident to them what they're doing is - good. What about the Humanism of the Greeks and Romans who widely practiced slavery and infanticide?

But, what you're alluding to is the Christian idea of Natural Law, in which we DO in fact know the difference intrinsically between right and wrong. The difference is from the theistic worldview, Natural Law is imbued with objective meaning and consequence, but from the atheistic worldview, Natural Law, is nothing more than subjective, social empathy.

It's ironic that you mention atheistic objectivity as the apparent cure-all for the "transformative fantasy" of religion. Atheists gave us a nice insight into what their capable of with Hitler, Stalin and Mao, the worst killers of the 20th century... no?

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 25, 2007 8:24 AM

Caroline, I did say that I knew it sounded short, and the reason for it are comments like _this_:

>>In an atheistic world-view, there is no "right" or "wrong," no absolutes.

Could you and others kindly refrain from making statements like that? Whether you live or die is an absolute, whether a course of action promotes life and happiness, is an absolute, whether we have a free society or one based on tyrrany or misery, is an absolute.

_These are all absolutes_. The Universe is an absolute as is every particle within it, and so is human life and what will and will not promote that human life.

Caroline, vis a viz the Buddha, I have a sneaking respect for him, because unlike all the other preachers of annihilation, he gives it to you straight. He doesn't disguise his message behind folderol about life in another dimension - the goal is Nirvana, annihilation, period.

Some of his teachings - mindfulness for example - are moral, but since the ultimate goal is annihilation, a great deal of it is life hating.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 25, 2007 10:58 AM

>>Atheists gave us a nice insight into what their capable of with Hitler, Stalin and Mao

Hitler? You mean the devout Catholic who never stopped invoking Christ and who was strongly supported by the Vatican and the Protestant sects? Stalin? The guy who wrote concilliatory letters to the Pope and the Russian Orthodox Church?

During the twentieth century religions either _supported_ the hideous totalitarian movements, or were absolutely useless in preventing them. And throughout history, the majority of transformative fantasy ideologies were _religious_. I never said they _all_ were, just most of them.

The problem is _faith_ by its nature corrupts everything. Every major horror in human history has had faith behind it.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 25, 2007 11:05 AM

Fanusi,

I think, Friend, that your grasp of history is faulty and surface-deep.

It is an established fact that Hitler and Stalin both persecuted the Christian churches--stroking and benign words not withstanding closer scrutiny.
(Mussolini, too--cf. Non abbiamo bisogno, June 29, 1931 Concerning Catholic Action, Pope Pius XI.) See the stand the Church takes: consult the papal encyclicals Divini Redemptoris, March 1, 1937; and most especially, [in German] Mit brennender Sorge, March 14 [read publicly--in Germany-- Easter Sunday], 1937; both by Pius XI. It probably suffices to read the last of these.

Adolf Hitler left the Catholic Church before he even entered politics; please cite, from credible sources, clear evidence to the contrary--not of his false posturing, but of his innate convictions.

I'm currently reading The Myth of Hitler's Pope, by Rabbi David G. Dalin (2005,Regnery Publishing). The book covers many of these issues, for those who wish to dig deeper.

Finally, I think, your general animus against religion probably rests on an exaggerated footing.

Yours cordially,

Posted by: John C

at August 25, 2007 2:00 PM

I meant to say, also, that Adolf Hitler believed in a pantheistic diety he called God, but not in the genuine Christ or the Judeo-Christian God.

Note to Kybeline: You are right about the later-date origins and significance of Mohammed's association with Jerusalem, IMO.

Posted by: John C

at August 25, 2007 2:11 PM

Peaceful_Muslims: "at the risk of getting slightly Off-Topic from the JW website, Fanusi stated "Justice, Integrity, Productiveness, Rationality, Courage, Honesty... these are all absolute requirements for human life.

"Well, sort-of. In an atheistic world-view, there is no "right" or "wrong," no absolutes. Why would the above attributes be "absolute requirements" for human life if there are no ultimate consequences for our actions?"

-----

At the risk of further offending Fanusi, my problem with that list is not so much whether or not the atheist thinks there are consequences to his actions because I'm going to grant here that the atheist just has some innate goodness that wills him to do the Good as he understands it whether or not he is rewarded or punished and that he indeed desires to do the Good irrespective of consequences.

But even if that were the case, at least some of those capitalized (I guess we could call them) "Virtues" are pretty abstract - Justice and Courage (and even Integrity).

Courage for what? Courage to blow oneself up in the service of Allah? Courage to remove oneself from society for several years to meditate until one reaches enlightenment? Courage to go to war and possibly die in order to eradicate slavery?

Courage is an abstract virtue. If someone is courageous in pursuing the wrong end, does that make their action moral, wise or good?

The same could be said for Justice. I'm sure that Justice is indeed a universal "virtue". But what constitutes "justice"? Sharia law? The death penalty? Quick forgiveness of even a heinous crime followed by a serious effort to rehabilitate the criminal back into society?

Same with integrity? That's really abstract! No doubt the executioner thinks he is acting with integrity in delivering what he conceives as "justice". No doubt the capital punishment protester thinks he is acting with integrity when he stands outside the courthouse on his last minute vigil to save the man who is about to die.

In short, those virtues strike me as pretty empty or "contentless". They could presumably be put to good aims or bad aims.

Not trying to open a whole can of worms here - that's just how they strike me.

Fanusi: "Some of his teachings - mindfulness for example - are moral, but since the ultimate goal is annihilation, a great deal of it is life hating."

It's interesting that you say that about Buddhism. Too bad remote was banned because he was always trying to explain to me how Buddhism (or what some people call the "perennial philosophy - which essentially underlies the New Age movement) is at bottom a form of Gnosticism, which sees the earthly realm as something evil (the "demiurge") which we need to escape from. He was trying to explain to me (so patiently on several occasions) that Christianity provides the perfect balance for reconciling the tension between the "transcendent" (I guess you call it) and the fallen world. Buddhism and other variants of Gnosticism as I understood his argument simply can't bridge that gap. Which I guess is the nihilism you're describing. He always viewed islam as a an extreme form of Gnosticism.

It's something I'm still trying to understand. One practically needs a Ph.D. in philosophy to discuss all this intelligently.

On the other hand - apparently to the atheist much of this is self-evident! (although it's not to us agnostics).

Posted by: Caroline

at August 25, 2007 3:20 PM

Incidentally Fanusi - there is one thing I think we can agree upon. You said: "Some of his teachings - mindfulness for example - are moral, but since the ultimate goal is annihilation, a great deal of it is life hating."

I think you make an excellent point that if we are looking for some objective moral virtue, "mindfulness" is indeed a good candidate.

But presumably genuine "mindfulness" shouldn't have a foregone conclusion or a preconceived goal that say "annihilation" is the outcome. Why should it? If Buddhists actually practice mindfulness with the intention of achieving what the Buddha achieved - how can they really be truly "mindful"? (That conundrum seems to lie at the heart of Zen Buddhism. If it's something you're trying to achieve you never will because the goal itself blocks the mindfulness)

I have always been a big fan of the writings of Jiddu Krishnamurti for that reason. He certainly goes on endlessly about mindfulness (what he calls "awareness") but he never presumes to tell anyone what the outcome will be.

The interesting thing about "mindfulness" is that (unlike say "courage") it is a kind of "pure" virtue, which doesn't require some larger moral frame of reference to define whether or not it is being aimed in the "right direction" as it were. In other words, how could one possibly be "mindful" in a good or bad way? One can't because mindfulness doesn't presuppose anything. It's as close to a pure virtue as I can think of. (Which isn't the same thing as moral relativism at all, in case anyone miscontrues my point).

Posted by: Caroline

at August 25, 2007 3:57 PM

Quoth Peaceful_Muslims?:

In an atheistic world-view, there is no "right" or "wrong," no absolutes.

It is very ironic to have just explained that there is no universal atheistic weltanschauung, and then come across this comment. It appears to be a perfect example of anti-atheist bigotry.

For that matter, it's hypocritical. Are there absolute rights and wrongs in theistic world-views? What would a liberal Episcopalian and a Muslim jihadist agree on, just to pick one example? That's the great thing about divine revelation: you can almost always find one to back up anything you want to believe, and there's no way to prove any of them wrong within the conceptual framework.

I expect that Hugh Fitzgerald, who has affirmed his atheism above, would take exception to the implied slur on his morality if he could be bothered to read and respond.

Why would the above attributes be "absolute requirements" for human life if there are no ultimate consequences for our actions?

I'm assuming that "ultimate consequences" is code for judgement after death. Of course, the whole point of those supposed consequences is to affect how people live in the here and now. Is there any sane objection to the claim that the absolute requirements of human life include food and water? Shelter and clothing in all but a few parts of the world? Security against physical attack? Do you really need divine revelation to tell you what can be determined empirically?

I think what bothers some theists is that empiricism — the discarding of allegedly divine diktat for the proof borne of observation and test — has the capability to show that religion often falls short as a guide to living in this world. This is a threat to their faith, so they attack it (not all as viciously as Muslims, but vigorously enough). What theists ought to realize is that if something puts you on the Islamic side, you ought to give it a very thorough, critical, unflinching evaluation... and be prepared to declare it anathema.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 25, 2007 9:50 PM

It occurred to me that Jesus of Nazareth treated women in general with the same deferential respect that a pious Jew shows his own mother. (I do not think He was being curt or demeaning when He addressed His own mother as "Woman.")

By contrast, perhaps a lack or loss of maternal nurture stamped Mohammed's character; I don't know.

But the attitudes of Jesus and Mohammed, respectively, toward women shape the ethos regarding women in the particular creed each founded. The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world, as we say.

Posted by: John C

at August 25, 2007 10:09 PM

E-P,

You ask, "are there absolute rights and wrongs in theistic world-views?" That, as you note, depends upon the particular theism, as they are not all equivalent and interchangeable. Moral relativism doesn't provide workable, testable answers.

Speaking for myself, taking the initiative to shape and enlighten my own conscience, and then acting appropriately isn't easy for a theist. But the creed I embrace (by choice) acknowledges the inviolability of conscience, and the necessity to examine one's conscience and test everything in the light of objective truth. And that truth revealed by reason cannot negate truth revealed by faith, however paradoxical, as they both have one source, God (synonymous with Truth, the Transcendant, and the Good).

And NO, I wouldn't presume to question your morality, just because you're an atheist. The question is not, "Do you have a god?" [God exists independently of you or me]; rather, "Do you have a conscience governed by universal reason?"

Posted by: John C

at August 25, 2007 11:08 PM

>>Adolf Hitler left the Catholic Church before he even entered politics; please cite, from credible sources, clear evidence to the contrary--not of his false posturing, but of his innate convictions.>>

Fabulous way of leaving an escape hatch open. So, no matter what I cite, it can always be ignored as 'false posturing'. Well, let me deal with this first off. Even if _every single one_ of Hitler's invocations of Christianity was just a cynical way of manipulating the masses, the fact is it worked. They followed. So, _at best_ all you can argue is that Christianity just made human beings very willing and able to follow Hitler. Great endorsement.

Onward to the meat of the argument:

In 1941 he said "I will remain a Catholic forever"

My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people.

-Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922 (Norman H. Baynes, ed. The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, April 1922-August 1939, Vol. 1 of 2, pp. 19-20, Oxford University Press, 1942)

I was not in agreement with the sharp anti-Semitic tone, but from time to time I read arguments which gave me some food for thought.

At all events, these occasions slowly made me acquainted with the man and the movement, which in those days guided Vienna's destinies: Dr. Karl Lueger and the Christian Social Party.

-Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

How many of my basic principles were upset by this change in my attitude toward the Christian Social movement!

My views with regard to anti-Semitism thus succumbed to the passage of time, and this was my greatest transformation of all.

-Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.

-Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Pay attention to those last few quotes. _It was Christinity_ that gave Hitler his virulent anti-Semitism.

And so on. He also said 'We have undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations: we have stamped it out'.

Hitler an atheist. Suuuuurrre...

Oh, and here is what Pope Pius XII said:

"To the Illustrious Herr Adolf Hitler, Fuhrer and Chancellor of the German Reich! Here at the beginning of Our Pontificate We wish to assure you that We remain devoted to the spiritual welfare of the German people entrusted to your leadership... " And so on. The only Nazi Party member to be excommunicated was Joseph Goebbels, and _that_ was for marrying a protestant (Great priorities in ethics Chrisitanity encourages, n'est ce pas?). 25% of the SS were practicing Catholics. The Vatican then spirited Nazi war criminals away to South America after the war, providing them with passports, documents, money, and so on.

And on and on it goes. In Slovakia, the Nazi puppet regime was headed by one _Father_ Tiso. The Church was a reliable ally of fascism in Spain, Portugal, and Italy. _At best_ there were zero protests, and, as the above indicates, there was often far worse.

So a little less of the attempt to justify Christianity on the grounds that its crimes are less than those of the Fascists and Communists. They were complicit in those too.

Caroline, when it comes to virtues, you have asked my definitions of them. Well, you are right for things like Courage - the word is meaningless sans context.

Let me start with some of them. _Justice_ is not adherence to some legal code - though legal codes may be just - but is the recognition that human beings _are_ what they _are_, and must be treated as such - that in the same way the healthy organism seeks the best food it can find, we must seek the best we can in other human beings. In other words, we need to admire virtues that have been demonstrated repeatedly through action, and condemn vices. I have already explained the list of virtues I consider cardinal.

Courage isn't suicidal terrorism, but the function of remaining _true to reality_. Human beings of great courage have fought against tyranny and died doing so, because they understood that the alternative - living in fear - is so much worse.

Honesty is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake reality. Lying to another human being places you in a position of perpetual inferiority, where you necessarily are condemned to faking reality for them, and where the wellspring of all of their virtues that might have helped you - their rationality - is now a deadly enemy. To put it another way, if you cheat your way into a job for which you are unqualified, you are stuck forever faking and living in fear of being found out.

Integrity is acknowledging that you are a unit of mind and body, and that you cannot truly hold a virtue without acting on it. To be unwilling to act on your convictions is to inform yourself that you are unable to achieve what you hold as good, and to condemn yourself to a life of self-doubt.

This is what I mean by the virtues that are essential to human life. To be unjust, or dishonest, or unproductive, or lacking in integrity is to make yourself into a being that is only capable of experiencing pain and misery and only capable of causing the same in others.

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 26, 2007 8:04 AM

Well, Hitler wasn't a Christian. Even if he said he was a Christian, if you read the Bible and understand what it means to be a Christian, you'll know that his actions belied his words.

"By their fruits you will know them."

Just like when people say Islam is a religion of peace. Take a look around and judge by their actions, not their words.

A man can tell you he loves you all he wants in between punches but I'd believe the bruises over the sweet talk.

Christ also did not hate life or teach hatred of life. This statement reveals an ignorance of the teachings of Christ.

Whether virtues are essential to human life or not, I don't know. I thought food, water and shelter were essential for human life. Adherence to a common code of conduct that benefits society as a whole is a hallmark of a good civilization, I think.

I'm a Christian. My husband is an atheist and he is moral, decent and good. He is kind, brave and generous. His parents were not religious and he didn't go to church when he was growing up. Religion would change his ideas about God and heaven but it wouldn't make him a better man (or else he'd be a saint).

Many people say they are religious but their characters have obviously not be transformed by their religious beliefs or practices.

Many people who are not religious are good, decent, honest folk.

Human nature is the same no matter what religious cloak we wear.

I think the difference with some religious folk is that we are striving to become better people through our beliefs. Some of us strive to emulate our God or religious ideal.

That's the crux of the Islam vs Christianity issue here: when Christians strive to emulate Christ (based on the teachings of Christ found in the Bible), they become kinder, gentler, more loving people. But what happens when Muslims strive to emulate Mohammed (based on the teachings of Mohammed found in the Koran and other Islamic holy texts)? Jihad, jihad, jihad.

Posted by: Josephine

at August 26, 2007 3:01 PM

Fanusi Khiyal-

Your history is so way off base I'm not even sure where to begin.

Okay, everyone raise your hand if you think Hitler went to mass on Sundays, was obedient to the Pope, treated priests and Christians well, said his prayers every night... Come on, wake up from the delusion. Hitler was most certainly not a Christian.

Obviously you have not read Robert's book yet. Let me give you a quote from it:

"Adolf Hitler was baptized a Catholic, but repudiated his Catholic faith early in life. His desire to annihilate the Jews was motivated not by Christian principles, but by the race-based social Darwinism undergirding the National Socialist regime." (p.121)

Hitler's antisemitism was rooted in Darwinian racial theories, not Christianity.

Also, nice dodge on Stalin and Mao..

Engineer-Poet-

"anti-atheist bigotry" "slur on his morality"
what????

I simply stated that atheists have no metaphysical or philosophical reason to act morally. You mention absolutes of the physical world. This has nothing to do with what I was talking about. I'm talking about an underlying philosophical reason to act morally. Atheists don't have one, period. They can act morally, certainly, out of subjective and empathetic desire to better the world. But, from their worldview - one without any ontological or teleological meaning (ie,atheism) - all MORAL actions are without meaning.

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 26, 2007 8:50 PM

>>Hitler's antisemitism was rooted in Darwinian racial theories, not Christianity

Great. I give you raw data, direct quotes from the mans own writings that say who introduced him to anti-semitism. Do you marshall other data? Do you attempt to refute the large scale quotations that I have from Hitler himself? Do you bring any raw data to the argument? That would be no, no and no.

Nor is the point answered - by you or Mr. Spencer - that even if Hitler were no Christian and only used his Christian rhetoric to sway the Christian masses - the fact is they swayed. So, _at best_ all you can claim for Christianity is that it made people spectacularly willing to follow Hitler.

And no, his persecutions against Christians do not count as evidence of alack of Christianity. Christians have done that for millenia, ever since the Church hunted the Arian heresy to death.

N.B.: If you actually did some _research_ you might have found some of Hitler's anti-Christian quotations. However, they appear later in his life, towards the end, when he was blaming everything on everyone else. That his initial convictions were Christian is impossible to argue against.

>>"By their fruits you will know them."

Exactly. I look and I see that Christianity cast us into the Dark Ages, and we spent a thousand years extricating ourselves from that mess. During which time, learning was all but extinguished. Not to mention the fact that one Christian heresy - Islam - is still causing trouble today. And, yes, it _is_ a Christian heresy, that's why Muhammad is found in Dante's Inferno in the circle of heretics.

I think of the endless misery inflicted when Christianity was powerful and think "No thanks".

Posted by: Fanusi Khiyal

at August 27, 2007 4:40 AM

Quoth Peaceful_Muslims?:

Hitler's antisemitism was rooted in Darwinian racial theories, not Christianity.

That is a shibboleth of evolution denialists, and it's highly tendentious.

simply stated that atheists have no metaphysical or philosophical reason to act morally... I'm talking about an underlying philosophical reason to act morally.

It's very ironic for you to say this, because this blog features on a daily basis the most extreme examples of moral relativism coming from... theists. Your complaint appears to be that a non-theistic morality cannot make the argument from authority for its backing. On the other hand, theism depends on revelation alone, and anyone can claim to have had the Unchanging Immutable Truth given to them personally. The advantage of the non-theistic morality is that you can show if it fails to achieve its purported goals and prove that it needs to be changed and how; if revelation fails, you better hope that whoever has a reputation as a prophet can get things right.

You mention absolutes of the physical world. This has nothing to do with what I was talking about.

Which prophet would I have to rely on to see your side as you do, and how do I know they are what they say they are?

But, from their worldview - one without any ontological or teleological meaning (ie,atheism) - all MORAL actions are without meaning.

You've got an Objectivist in this thread. If you've bothered to read any Ayn Rand (to name just one) you'd know that there are some pretty good arguments to the contrary, and Objectivists in my experience tend to live up to their morality a lot better than e.g. Baptists do.

Posted by: Engineer-Poet

at August 27, 2007 1:49 PM

I myself don't condemn Darwin or Darwinism for Nazi racial theories, as I hold Darwin in much higher regard that that.

What we are talking about here is the appropriation and misapplication of Darwin's ideas from biological science to political, social, and cultural theories--crank ones at that, like equating states, classes, and cultures to biological organisms, or equating the relative idea of "fitness" with rank and superiority. Call it Social Darwinism or Daltonism, but DON'T call it science, or call its critics "anti-science." This is, in fact, the genesis of Nazi racial tenets, coupled with neo-pagan and occultic mysticism.

Creationism is not the source of this indictment of Naziism, even though creationists make a "tendentious" link between Darwin and Hitler. That's too glib a connection between the two for me, and I sense that the broad strokes of your own reasoning lapse into fallacy. Honestly, no offense meant.

Posted by: John C

at August 27, 2007 3:48 PM

I meant, "similarly lapse into fallacy."

Posted by: John C

at August 27, 2007 3:55 PM

I make reference to "Daltonism" above; I meant "Galtonism."

Posted by: John C

at August 27, 2007 9:32 PM

TO: Fanusi

“This brings me to the second point, about 'science unbounded by any moral sense'. With respect, this is balderdash. Science cannot operate without morality. Science is, by its very nature, moral. In order to be able to work, a scientist must have dedication, he must have total honesty, and he must have justice in order to appreciate those who demonstrate these virutes themselves. And he must have integrity, as well as the deep pride in doing the best one can, as well as the humility in accepting that which he cannot and thus not make any unfounded speculations. These are all cardinal virtues.”

In the history of science there has been any number of dedicated honest scientists who believed in justice for other human beings.
Take for instance the dedicated scientists of the Third Reich who dedicated themselves to finding ways to exterminate people, oops, I mean untermensch. Of course you realize that untemensch are not strictly speaking human beings. (Right or wrong, these scientists honestly believed these theories to have been empirically proven.)

Take for instance the dedicated Islamic physicists in Iran. I have no doubt that they consider themselves to have integrity, oops, I mean their version of integrity; a version that once again looks at other peoples as eligible for annihilation. They are not all being forced, against their will, to help the mad mullahs develop their own weapons of mass destruction. (Right or wrong, these scientists honestly believe in the imperative to destroy the state of Israel as well as the great Satan, as well as all of Christianity.)

Your belief that science cannot operate without morality may have some merit. Unfortunately, you do not seem to understand that all of humanity does not share the same view of what it means to be moral.

“Now, I know what you are thinking: the atomic bomb. But nuclear weapons were developed at the behest, not of scientists, but of governments. The awful threat of atomic war is the result of what happens if scientists allow others - who may well claim ‘faith’ as their authority - to proscribe what is and is not moral for them.”

By the way, most of the scientists who worked on the Manhattan project knew fully well the purpose of their work. And except for the willfully blind, they also understood that the bomb would be used. It is a fact that had it been ready earlier, it would have been dropped over Germany. To blame this all on politicians is a matter of faith, not historical reality. “They just obeyed orders.”

PS I am not a fan of politicians but I am a Socratic disciple of personal responsibility.

Posted by: patagonianplato

at August 28, 2007 6:39 PM

Engineer Poet-

You said that "..theism depends on revelation alone." This is absolutely incorrect. Theism is not dependent upon divine revelation. What I have been talking about is philosophy, not divine revelation. Have you not heard "philosophy is the handmaid of theology?" Absolutes, and the existence of God, The Absolute, if you will, can be determined from reason alone. Again, hearkening back to Natural Law. I would recommend reading some St.Thomas Aquinas.

If there is no God, then there can be no absolute moral judgments. The most an atheist can say is something is good or bad RELATIVE to one's own experience. There can be only moral relativism, never an absolute moral judgment. Ironically, moral relativists argue for moral relativism Absolutely!

Posted by: Peaceful_Muslims?

at August 28, 2007 9:17 PM

Good job Robert Spencer! You ARE a true hero! Please stay safe and watch your back. The more people that discuss the truths of Islam and Islamic Jihad, the more the Jihadis will be put in their place. The rule of law must apply, the US isn't letting Muslim gangs run around raping schoolgirls.

If they ever try that stuff over here, I'm sure the cops will crack down hard. This is what is happening less and less in Europe. And that is just like spoiling little kids rotten. If the law continues not to clamp down and enforce law regarding violence it will just get worse and worse. Cracking down on a consistent basis will lead to some huge riots, but the law must stand their ground; even if their troops and police have to arrest hundreds and maybe even shoot that many violent rioters as well if need be.

Islam as practiced by the Islamofascists will never be peace because if Earth ever became ruled by Sharia Law all the multitudes of Islamic factions that hate each other would keep fighting each other forever.

Educate ourselves and others!

The Religion of Peace

The Brussels Journal

Gates of Vienna

Hard To Swallow

absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
allow religions to kill

believe its followers
when they claim to be peaceful

absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
never criticize prophets

there is no hateful scripture
claim it can't be translated

Robert Spencer Gets Peaceful Death Threats

Do American Liberals Want a Taliban Europe?
.

Posted by: USpace

at August 29, 2007 1:07 AM