I think we’re getting a little too bogged down in arguments as to what Christianity was like centuries ago.
I offered that example as a means to consider whether Islam can be reformed or not, because the other religion that holds that “my God is the only God and my religion is the only valid religion” found a way to stop conquering and slaughtering non-believers.
You can dispute that history, but what is far more important is how we can deal with Islam today, because what is being done now [inviting them in and trying to adjust to them rather than expecting them to assimilate] is not working.
Those of you who are entertaining the idea of replacing Islam with your religion as a solution are not being realistic.
If it turns out that Islam cannot be reformed — and certainly Islamic scriptures, history as well as current fanaticism may indicate this — then I fall back upon containment within traditional Islamic homelands and not allowing Muslims to settle in our nations.
What has served to contain Islamic expansion prior to the 20th Century is the economic and technological deterioration that inevitably accompanies totalitarianism. But the West is unwittingly providing the means to overcome this and that has to stop.
If Islam refuses to live in peace with non-believers, let them stew in their own juices.
Since I took none of those positions and you have ignored my posts I’ll take it that my points remain uncontested.
islam is based on earthly triumphalism -- that it conquers and keeps territory. This can be neutralized by destroying Mecca and Medina.
The Islamic world was shocked when they were consistently defeated by the Christian world and also by the defeats Hindu India inflicted on Moslem Pakistan
Islam as a philosophy cannot be remade, it can only be destroyed
That is not possible either -- this is an expansionist philosophy and one which can gain people to it who are of European/American origins as well as of Hindu, Buddhist etc. origins
the only way to contain it is to destroy it. Your point is like saying "contain communism in Soviet Russia"
“consider whether Islam can be reformed or not”
There have been many variations of Islam throughout the centuries, and some have been relatively easy to live with. Often, it is a reflection of the political leadership, but different doctrines and rules of interpretation make a big difference as well.
A major factor, is what is accepted as “Scripture” - that is to say, what is accepted as the basis to be interpreted. All muslims accept the Koran, and most accept the Hadith (the sayings and doings of muhammad and his companions).
The movement closest to what modern society would accept, is the “Koran only” school of thought which does not take muhammad’s example as a basis for law. When you accept muhammad’s behavior as a role model, or indeed as scripture, you end up with atrocities.
To really reform islam, you have to be able to distance yourself from the bad actions or example that muhammad set. You have to be able to say that such an example was just for a particular person in a particular situation, in a very different time - not an eternal standard for all. You have to objective morality, beyond just loyalty to the gang and its internal discipline (if it advanced muhammad’s power, he typically considered moral to kill, steal, rape, enslave, lie - whatever).
The “koran only” school is a tiny minority though - kind of a fringe academic theory - with its main proponents having been famously executed for their belief.
What you are left with (on the Sunni side) are the four “fiqh” - the four main schools for interpreting islam and developing sharia (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi, and Hanbali). Of the four, the smallest, but the most problematic is the Hanbali interpretation of the Saudis, Wahabbis, al Quaeda, ISIS, the Muslim Brotherhood, Boko Haram, and our worst Sunni extremists (so called salafists or takfiris).
What makes the Hanbali fiqh so particularly destructive is its extraordinarily rigid and mindless literal reading of a certain set of source documents (Quaran, Hadith, and a small slice time around the time of the first muslims), with rules of interpretation that force outcomes of genocide, atrocity and world conquest.
Hanbali insists on only pure literal reading of the text - no reasoning or moral judgement of any kind is allowed, based on the assumption that the texts are perfectly divine in origin, and that human intellect is inherently inferior.
Then, since there are many conflicts inherent in the supposedly perfect texts, they adopt the arbitrary rule that whatever comes later supersedes whatever went earlier. So all of muhammad’s early attempts to get along with other groups, and to tempt new followers with appealing ideas, were superseded by his later ruthless totalitarian repression and megalomaniacal ambitions. God apparently changed his mid several times during that small slice of time, and then never again, according to their simple-minded thinking. Muhammad’s final position was that he was commanded by allah to fight infidels until all accept that only God is allah and that muhammad is his (penultimate/final) prophet - which is where using Hanbali rules will always end up - endless struggle to impose a global totalitarian rule.
Hanbali also adopts muhammad as the best possible human role model, and so uses his example to fill in any area not specifically spelled out in the Koran. He is of course, a horrible role model, and disastrous results follow from that arbitrary rule. Handling disagreements when bound by such rules ultimately boils down to simply “Shut up or I’ll kill you”.
What islam needs to reform is to make reasonable judgements as to objective moral standards an emphasis on deliberate development of good character that accords with objective morality - rather than slavish and unthinking adherence to the whims of a despot long since dead as the highest (indeed only) measure of goodness. They need to be able to interpret scripture as guidance to inform moral judgement, rather than rigid rules that supersede morality.