Is Islam a religion of peace?

Townhall.com ^ | 12/02/02 | Pat Buchanan

[kattracks]

"I think Muhammad was a terrorist ... a violent man, a man of war," said the Rev. Jerry Falwell on "60 Minutes." He added, "Jesus set the example for love. ... Muhammad set an opposite example." Murderous riots broke out in India, and an Iranian cleric threatened Falwell with assassination. "The Koran teaches that the end of the world will not come until every Jew is killed by Muslims," says the Rev. Pat Robertson. He compares the Koran's message on Jews to "Mein Kampf." "There is no doubt the religion of Muhammad ... is extreme and violent."

"I don't believe this is a wonderful, peaceful religion," adds Franklin Graham, son of Billy Graham, "When you read ... the verses from the Koran, it instructs the killing of the infidel ... those that are non-Muslim."

What does President Bush think of this bashing of Islam by his Christian friends? He rejects it. "Islam is a religion of peace."

Colin Powell is less charitable: "We will reject the kind of comments ... where people in this country say that Muslims are responsible for the killing of all Jews, and who put out hatred. This kind of hatred must be rejected."

Is Islam a religion of peace? Why, then, was an American Christian woman murdered in south Lebanon by an Islamic fanatic, after Christians were warned to stop proselytizing for the faith?

If Islam is a religion of peace, how do you explain four days of Muslim rioting in Kaduna, Nigeria, against a Miss World pageant, after a journalist wrote that Muhammad might have chosen one of the beauty queens as one of his wives? Those riots left 1,500 hospitalized and 215 dead.

Islam has "bloody borders," says Harvard Professor Samuel Huntington. Is he not right? From Algeria to Afghanistan to the Philippines, Muslim insurgencies rage in a dozen countries.

Yet the president, too, has a point. In America, a huge Islamic community lives at peace with its Christian and Jewish neighbors. Around the world are a billion Muslims, only a tiny fraction of whom are waging jihad against Christian minorities or their own rulers.

How to explain the dichotomy? We are at the beginning of a religious and political revolution in the Islamic world. Like all revolutions, it is marked at its extremes by militancy, intolerance and a sometimes murderous xenophobia. What is being worked out, often violently, are the terms of Islam's engagement with a hedonistic, triumphalist West that both attracts and repels the Muslim faithful.

In northern Nigeria, this revolution is religious and cultural -- at war with both Christianity and a neo-pagan MTV culture. In Algeria, Islamic jihadists seek to overthrow a secular-socialist state brought to power by the war of independence. In southern Lebanon, militants want Christians out, now that Hezbollah has driven the Israelis out. In Palestine, Hamas and Islamic Jihad add religious fanaticism to a nationalist cause. Should Arafat become president of Palestine, he will face an Islamic party more rabid than the religious parties Sharon must cope with.

In Chechnya and western China, Islamic guerrillas seem more secessionist than fundamentalist. In Egypt, Islamic extremism is manifest in assassination attempts of pro-Western scholars, the slaughter of tourists and the persecution of the Copts.

Yet, while all this violence is the daily fare of our front pages, how many Islamic terrorists, guerrillas, assassins and rioters are there, when you consider that if they add up to 1,000,000, it would be less than 0.1 percent of the Muslims on earth? And not all the causes for which Muslims fight -- independence for Chechnya and Palestine, secession from Russia, Indonesia and China -- are inherently unjust or evil.

Islam is in a revivalist phase. In the lands where it is predominant, there is often little tolerance of rival religions seeking the conversion of Muslims. So it is that Falwell, Robertson and Graham, too, have a point. Between militant Islam and Christian fundamentalism, there is an unbridgeable chasm of belief, and in the Islamic world, devout Christians are citizens under suspicion -- just as Jews and Muslims were in Isabella's Spain and Catholics were in Elizabethan England.

Yet, in his sense that we must avoid war with militant Islam, lest we find ourselves at war with all Islam, President Bush is surely right.

In the last century, America was threatened by a global communist revolution. Avoiding all-out war, we outlasted it. And we can outlast this Islamist revolution. What we must avoid is a war of faiths, a war of civilizations between Islam and America. And those who propagandize for such a war are the unwitting or willful collaborators of Osama bin Laden.

©2002 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Contact Pat Buchanan | Read his biography

[Johnny Shear]

In the last century, America was threatened by a global communist revolution. Avoiding all-out war, we outlasted it. And we can outlast this Islamist revolution. What we must avoid is a war of faiths, a war of civilizations between Islam and America. And those who propagandize for such a war are the unwitting or willful collaborators of Osama bin Laden.

Uh, ohhhhhh......The "It's a religion of peace" uttering bigots around here aren't going to like THAT bit of truth! And coming from one of their own???

No...Those wanting a holy war aren't going to like that at all.

[ctnoell]

Hopefully Iran is going through that as we speak.

[xsysmgr]

...any map that shows the spread of islamism is not re-postable on the Free Republic.

Here's your map:

[lavaroise]

That Mohammed was a man requiring special privileges such as marrying 6 year old girls and that Islam tolerates such privileging hedonism in their own nations, we can see who is really decadent, despite the West's decadence: it is Islam.

[omegab]

In the interest of "fair and balanced" I'm posting an article for you to read and hope the author is right.

A CHRISTIAN BOOM - New York Post
November 26, 2002 -- WHICH of the worlds largest faiths, Christianity or Islam, is experiencing the greater ideological reassertion and demographic surge?
Islam is surely nearly everyones answer. As American Christians experiment with ever-milder versions of their faith, Muslims display a fervor for extreme interpretations of Islam. As Europe suffers the lowest population growth rates ever recorded, Muslim countries have some of the highest.

But, argues Philip Jenkins recently in the Atlantic Monthly, Islam is the wrong answer. He shows how Christianity is the religion currently undergoing the most basic rethinking and the largest increase in adherents. He makes a good case for its militancy most affecting the next century.

For obvious reasons, notes this professor of history and religious studies at Pennsylvania State University, news reports today are filled with material about the influence of a resurgent and sometimes angry Islam. But in its variety and vitality, in its global reach, in its association with the worlds fastest-growing societies, in its shifting centers of gravity, in the way its values and practices vary from place to place . . . it is Christianity that will leave the deepest mark on the 21st century.

What Jenkins dubs the Christian revolution is so little noted because Christians divide into two very different regions North (Europe, North America, Australia) and South (South America, Africa, Asia) and we who live in the North only dimly perceive the momentous developments under way in the South. Fortunately, Jenkins is there to guide us.

Faith: The changes in the South run utterly contrary to those in the liberalizing North, where religious beliefs and practices are ever more removed from traditional Christianity. In the South, Protestant movements are mainly Evangelical or Pentecostal, while Roman Catholicism takes an orthodox cast.

By Northern lights, the Souths theology and moral teaching are stalwartly traditional or even reactionary, what with their respect for the power of priests, their notions of spiritual charisma, their aspiration to direct spiritual revelation, their efforts to exorcise demonic forces and their goal of re-creating a version of early Christianity. As Southern Christians are reading the New Testament and taking it very seriously, increasing tensions develop with the liberal Northerners.

Demographics: Christians are facing a shrinking population in the liberal West and a growing majority of the traditional Rest. During the past half century the critical centers of the Christian world have moved decisively to Africa, to Latin America, and to Asia. The balance will never shift back.

The numbers are jaw-dropping: Nigeria already has more practicing Anglicans than any other country, with Uganda not far behind. The Philippines has more baptisms per year than France, Spain, Italy and Poland together. By 2025, two-thirds of all Christians (and three-quarters of all Catholics) are expected to live in the South. (This actually understates the contrast in growth rates: Many Southern Christians are relocating to the North. In London today, half of all churchgoers are blacks.) Under present trends, by 2050 non-Latino whites will make up just one in five of the worlds Christians.

Of course, the chasm between North and South is not complete (a fact that Jenkins hardly touches on); the United States, for example, contains substantial numbers of Christians with a Southern outlook. That said, the trends are clear:

Î Although Islam may appear to be the faith of choice for the worlds poor, Christianity is faring at least as well among them.

Î Christianity is no longer predominantly a European and North American faith.

Î The experimentation and decline that pervades Northern Christianity is less important than it appears.

Î The concept of Christendom may re-emerge in the South, where political, social and personal identities are being primarily defined by religious loyalties.

Î An enormous rift seems inevitable between North and South, possibly leading to a split in the Christian church, similar to what happened centuries ago between the Catholic Church and the Protestant movements.

Î Christianity and Islam are on a collision course, competing for converts and influence. Some countries might be brought to ruin by the clash of jihad and crusade.

To understand the future of Christianity, then, keep your eye on those Southern believers who reject the Norths liberal outlook and who increasingly dominate the faith.

Daniel Pipes (www.DanielPipes.org) is director of the Middle East Forum and author of Militant Islam Reaches America (W.W. Norton).

[Cultural Jihad]

Well said, Secretary Powell. Bigots and extremists must be rejected by civilized men and women always, regardless of whether they wear turbans or pointy hoods on their heads.

[EternalHope]

Am I suggesting we declare war on over 1 billion million Moslems? The question is moot – Islam has declared war on the rest of the human race. When one side knows it’s at war and the other thinks peace and brotherhood prevail, guess who wins?

The question is NOT moot.

We are receiving substantial help from Turkey as we speak. They are indispensable to our efforts in Afghanistan, and indispensable as a base for our coming war with Iraq.

We are receiving indispensable help from Kuwait and the various small states along the border of Saudi Arabia in the form of bases for our troops. These nations are helping, even though they face the liklihood of an attack by Iraq using weapons of mass destruction when the war with Iraq begins.

The help we are getting is extremely valuable. We cannot take on even a pimple like Saddam without bases to launch our attacks from. Do you want to throw that away?

A major objective of those on the evil side of Islam is to unite all of Islam against us. That has NOT, repeat, NOT happened. Yet. It most definitely could. Why make it easier for them to achieve this objective?

Even if Mohammed was evil incarnate we would still need bases to fight from. Do you want to throw that away?

We may very well end up fighting all of Islam at once. If so, do not expect the terrified nations of Europe to help. Do not expect Mexico or Canada, either. It would not save them if we lost, but almost all of the rest of the world would turn tail and run.

In other words, we would have to win this fight with a very short list of allies (perhaps only Great Britain, India, Israel, and Australia). We would not have the logistics necessary to go after Iraq directly, and would have to fight for every base we need.

We could probably win that war, if only the Dassholes in our own country would stand aside. But they would not. The outcome would be very much in doubt.

It should be obvious. We benefit if we do not have to fight all of Islam at once.

A big part of the enemy's efforts thus far have centered on attempts to unite all of Islam against us. They may well succeed. We should not make it easier for them.

[A CA Guy]

Many think if we get a change of leadership in Iraq, it will inspire folks in Iran to do that themselves.

That would be a bonus.

[A CA Guy]

It is not common sense to just go with luck, most try to defend themselves.

[EternalHope]

Communism was/is evil. But we had Russia on our side in WWII, and it's a good thing we did. That we had to defeat communism later does not change the FACT that defeating Hitler would have been much more difficult if Russia had not been in the fight too.

We are in a similar position now. We MUST HAVE bases if we are to defeat Iraq, and that means we MUST HAVE allies in the Middle East. Once Iraq is neutralized, Iran is likely to change without our having to fire a shot.

At that point, the entire balance of power will have changed. Saudi Arabia can either toe the line, or they can be next in line to fight us. They know they would be a pushover, so they would toe the line.

In other words, this whole thing becomes a lot easier if we can keep the Muslims from uniting before we do the job in Iraq.

The Islamists know this, and are doing everything they can to prevent it from happening. They are desperate to unite Islam against us before we irreversibly change the balance of power.

The most important strategic issue RIGHT NOW is the attempt to unite Islam against us. We are doing everything we can to prevent this from happening. Based on the level of insanity manifest in much of the Muslim world, the outcome is very much in doubt. We should not do anything that helps unite an evil foe against us.

See post 71 for related comments.

[Howlin]

any map that shows the spread of islamism is not re-postable on the Free Republic.

You're kidding, right?

[SCalGal]

An excellent post. The others are right; you should have it published.

[GaryMontana]

I would love to have it published.

I am working on a book "Death of an Empire - the rise of Islamic Terrorism."

[Dajjal]

HAPPY RAMADAN!!!