Posted on 07/21/2006 7:12:46 AM PDT by Dark Skies
Beneath the rule of men entirely great,
The pen is mightier than the sword.
A detailed pontification enumerating the fundamental flaws of one's opposition is only useful when both operate under a sane and just society.
When one party is, instead, screeching "kafir!" and trying to terminate you, joint academic pontification makes little progress.
Islam/Global Jihad Ping !
Islam/Global Jihad Ping !
Wow, I wish you could put this on leaflets and have millions of them air dropped to several countries in the Middle East! Good job.
High volume. Articles on Israel can also be found by clicking on the Topic or Keyword Israel. also
2006israelwar or WOT
..................
bttt
Any group is measured not by its most enlightened, but by its most greedy, violent, ignorant and flawed; and how it treats them.
That is, all of us have relatives and neighbors, those in our group, our nation and our religion, who embarass and offend. But the only ones of us who can still hold their heads high are those that actively condemn and prosecute those closest to them, in defense of the strangers they have abused.
In Secular nations, society is and should be utterly indifferent to the religion of the offender and victim. Neither is advataged or disadvantaged before the law. And this is why Secular nations disparage religious nations in which the law is unfair.
And know that "secular" does not mean "atheist"; it means that all in society are ruled by the same laws, not by the whim of priests, whatever they call themselves. Laws that are written by men and women, and can be changed by men and women.
In fact, this unfairness is the sole difference between a Moslem who is enlightened, and one who is not. Either he treats all people, and not just men, but women as well, as equal, or he does not. And "equality" is not a vague concept, open to equivocation, and it is not dependent on reciprocation. You are not treating people equally if you demand payment for that treatment from some.
If you demand that a woman wear a burka, she has the same right to demand that you, a man, wear a burka too. And both of you have the right to refuse to wear it. To do otherwise is to say the whim of the priest overrules the law.
If the people vote for religious law, and that those laws be unfair, then the people are wrong. Others are right in damning them as ignorant and unjust. They cannot claim that their "way" is equal to the "way" of those who are just, solely because they voted for it. Democracy demands a higher standard than the will of the majority in all things.
So, all this being said, can Moslems be "enlightened"?
That is a good question. Islam is hemorrhaging believers, and it is noteworthy that they do not just "stop being Moslems", or quit calling themselves Moslems. For the most part, they convert to Christianity; and in many cases *not* because of any great desire to be Christians, but solely so they can then say, "I am not a Moslem, I am a Christian", so that there will be no confusion in their rejection of Islam.
It took even the United States many years to drive its priests out of politics. Priests of all kinds yearn for power over others. Only when the people learned to have a creeping nausea at the very thought a shaman in political office, or a politician beholden to a shaman and his whims, were we able to break free to a much fairer, secular nation.
And it is a struggle that never ends. For not all priests are religious in character, and the atheist priests can be just as despicable.
Bump
Beautifully put.
Respectfully, we disagree.s/b, "Burn in Hell, dingleberries on the butt hairs of civilization!"
They are uneducated and illiterate because Islamic society wants them that way. Islam discourages science, art, music, creativity, etc. All the things that make our world a better place. This is why they have to come to the West to go to colleges and universities or buy their technology from someone else. Iran pumps out millions of barrels of oil daily but still imports thousands of gallons of gasoline since they are just now getting refining capabilities. The Islamic society still uses the models for government and social status from the 14th century, so let's send them back there.
I really tend to believe, as do not a few serious Islamic historians, that Islam as we know it, including the Koran, was an invention by the Arab leadership to keep their empire (over half the former Roman empire conquered by AD 750) intact. Mohammed, as Islam teaches him, is a myth...
It's not accident that the tyrants named their religion "submission"....as in Islam, submission to the Caliph is submission to God.
...It is foolish to insist that a book written over 1400 years ago must serve as the one and only guide for humanity...Some might say the same for the Bible. However, while their are examples of a wrathful God in the Bible, the teachings are overwhelmingly ones of compassion even for those who do not share the faith. No where in the Bible is the injunction to convert at the point of the sword. The Bible is also not stuck in prehistory. Universal teachings such as the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes apply today
Because they make mutually contradictory claims, all the world's religions cannot be simultaneously true. A fundamental postulate of logic is that a premise cannot be simutaneously true and false. The test of truth, then, is the ability of the religion's claims to withstand scrutiny (i.e. careful examination, not refutation of 'strawman' caricatures of what the adherents believe) in the free marketplace of ideas. When a religion's adherents fear or punish honest examination of the claims, one should take notice and flee.
Very good analogy. What you say is very true - all the Islamofacists say and think can be summed up in that one word: EXTERMINATE !
Not only that - but the New Testament is very clear: "Love your enemies as yourself".
I sure haven't read anything like that in the Koran.
Although true, that statement can be misleading. Some might interpret it to say, "All priest yearn for power over others, which is false. It is similar to the old saying, "Not all that glitters is gold.", which is true, often being misstated as, "All that glitters is not gold.", which is false.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.