Learn what the Quran really says about peace:

The Quran contains at least 109 verses that call Muslims to war with
nonbelievers for the sake of Islamic rule. Some are quite graphic, with
commands to chop off heads and fingers and kill infidels wherever they may be
hiding. Muslims who do not join the fight are called
'hypocrites' and warned that Allah will send them to Hell if they do not join
the slaughter.

Unlike nearly all of the Old
Testament verses of violence, the verses of violence in the Quran are mostly
open-ended, meaning that they are not restrained by the historical context of
the surrounding text. They are part of the eternal, unchanging word of Allah,
and just as relevant or subjective as anything else in the Quran.

Most of today's Muslims exercise a personal choice to interpret their holy
book's many calls to violence according to what their own moral preconceptions
find justificable. Apologists cater to their preferences with tenuous arguments
that gloss over historical fact and generally do not stand up to scrutiny.
Still, it is important to note that the problem is not bad people,
but bad ideology.

Unfortunately, there are very few verses of tolerance and peace to abrogate
or even balance out the many that call for nonbelievers to be fought and subdued
until they either accept humiliation, convert to Islam, or are killed.
Muhammad's own martial legacy - and that of his companions - along with the
remarkable stress on violence found in the Quran have produced a trail of blood
and tears across world history.

The Quran:

Quran
(2:191-193) - "And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of
the places whence they drove you out, for persecution [of
Muslims] is worse than slaughter [of non-believers]... but if they
desist, then lo! Allah is forgiving and merciful. And fight them until
persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah." The historical
context of this passage is not defensive warfare, since Muhammad and
his Muslims had just relocated to Medina and were not under attack by
their Meccan adversaries. In fact, the verses urge offensive warfare, in
that Muslims are to drive Meccans out of their own city (which they later
did). The use of the word "persecution" by some Muslim translators is thus disingenuous (the actual Muslim words for persecution - "idtihad" - and oppression - a variation of "z-l-m" - do not appear in the verse). The actual Arabic comes from "fitna" which can mean disbelief, or the disorder that results from unbelief or temptation. Taken as a whole, the context makes clear that violence is being authorized until "religion is for Allah" - ie.
unbelievers desist in their unbelief.

Quran
(2:244) - "Then fight in the cause of Allah, and know that Allah Heareth
and knoweth all things."

Quran
(2:216) - "Fighting is prescribed
for you, and ye dislike it. But it is possible that ye dislike a thing which
is good for you, and that ye love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah
knoweth, and ye know not." Not only does this verse establish that violence
can be virtuous, but it also contradicts the myth that fighting is intended only
in self-defense, since the audience was obviously not under attack at the time.
From the Hadith, we know that this verse was narrated at a time that Muhammad
was actually trying to motivate his people into raiding
merchant caravans for loot.

Quran
(3:56) - "As to those who reject faith, I will punish them with terrible
agony in this world and in the Hereafter, nor will they have anyone to
help."

Quran
(3:151) - "Soon shall We cast terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers,
for that they joined companions with Allah, for which He had sent no
authority". This speaks directly of polytheists, yet it also includes
Christians, since they believe in the Trinity (ie. what Muhammad incorrectly
believed to be 'joining companions to Allah').

Quran
(4:74) - "Let those fight in the way of Allah who sell the life of this
world for the other. Whoso fighteth in the way of Allah, be he slain or be he
victorious, on him We shall bestow a vast reward." The martyrs of Islam are
unlike the early Christians, led meekly to the slaughter. These Muslims are
killed in battle, as they attempt to inflict death and destruction for the cause
of Allah. Here is the theological basis for today's suicide bombers.

Quran
(4:76) - "Those who believe fight in the cause of Allah…"

Quran
(4:89) - "They but wish that ye should reject Faith, as they do, and thus
be on the same footing (as they): But take not friends from their ranks until
they flee in the way of Allah (From what is forbidden). But if they turn
renegades, seize them and slay them wherever ye find them; and (in any case)
take no friends or helpers from their ranks."

Quran
(4:95) - "Not equal are those believers who sit (at home) and receive no
hurt, and those who strive and fight in the cause of Allah with their goods and
their persons. Allah hath granted a grade higher to those who strive and fight
with their goods and persons than to those who sit (at home). Unto all (in
Faith) Hath Allah promised good: But those who strive and fight Hath He
distinguished above those who sit (at home) by a special reward,-" This
passage criticizes "peaceful" Muslims who do not join in the violence, letting
them know that they are less worthy in Allah's eyes. It also demolishes the
modern myth that "Jihad" doesn't mean holy war in the Quran, but rather a
spiritual struggle. Not only is the Arabic word used in this passage, but it is
clearly not referring to anything spiritual, since the physically
disabled are given exemption. (The Hadith reveals the context of the passage to
be in response to a blind man's protest that he is unable to engage in Jihad and
this is reflected in other translations of the verse).

Quran
(4:104) - "And be not weak hearted in pursuit of the enemy; if you suffer
pain, then surely they (too) suffer pain as you suffer pain..." Is pursuing
an injured and retreating enemy really an act of self-defense?

Quran
(5:33) - "The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His
messenger and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should
be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on
opposite sides or they should be imprisoned; this shall be as a disgrace for
them in this world, and in the hereafter they shall have a grievous
chastisement"

Quran
(8:12) - "I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve.
Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them" No
reasonable person would interpret this to mean a spiritual struggle.

Quran
(8:15) - "O ye who believe! When ye meet those who disbelieve in battle,
turn not your backs to them. (16)Whoso on that day turneth his back to them,
unless maneuvering for battle or intent to join a company, he truly hath
incurred wrath from Allah, and his habitation will be hell, a hapless journey's
end."

Quran
(8:39) - "And fight with them until there is no more fitna (disorder,
unbelief) and religion should be only for Allah" Some translations
interpret "fitna" as "persecution", but the traditional understanding of this
word is not supported by the historical context (See notes for 2:293, also).
The Meccans were simply refusing Muhammad access to their city during Haj.
Other Muslims were allowed to travel there - just not as an armed group, since
Muhammad had declared war on Mecca prior to his eviction. The Meccans were also
acting in defense of their religion, since it was Muhammad's intention to
destroy their idols and establish Islam by force (which he later did). Hence
the critical part of this verse is to fight until "religion is only for
Allah", meaning that the true justification of violence was the unbelief of
the opposition. According to the Sira (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 324) Muhammad further
explains that "Allah must have no rivals."

Quran
(8:57) - "If thou comest on them in the war, deal with them so as to
strike fear in those who are behind them, that haply they may remember."

Quran
(8:59-60) - "And let not those who disbelieve suppose that they can
outstrip (Allah's Purpose). Lo! they cannot escape. Make ready for them all
thou canst of (armed) force and of horses tethered, that thereby ye may dismay
the enemy of Allah and your enemy."

Quran
(8:65) - "O Prophet, exhort the believers to fight..."

Quran
(9:5) - "So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the
idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captive and besiege them and lie
in wait for them in every ambush, then if they repent and keep up prayer and pay
the poor-rate, leave their way free to them." According to this verse, the
best way of staying safe from Muslim violence is to convert to Islam (prayer
(salat) and the poor tax (zakat) are among the religion's Five
Pillars). This popular claim that the Quran only inspires violence within the
context of self-defense is seriously challenged by this passage as well, since
the Muslims to whom it was written were obviously not under attack. Had they
been, then there would have been no waiting period (earlier verses make it a
duty for Muslims to fight in self-defense, even during the sacred months).

Quran
(9:14) - "Fight them, Allah will punish them by your hands and bring them
to disgrace..."

Quran
(9:20) - "Those who believe, and have left their homes and striven with
their wealth and their lives in Allah's way are of much greater worth in Allah's
sight. These are they who are triumphant." The Arabic word interpreted as
"striving" in this verse is the same root as "Jihad". The context is obviously
holy war.

Quran
(9:29) - "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold
that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor
acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book,
until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued."
"People of the Book" refers to Christians and Jews. According to this
verse, they are to be violently subjugated, with the sole justification being
their religious status. This was one of the final "revelations" from Allah and
it set in motion the tenacious military expansion, in which Muhammad's
companions managed to conquer two-thirds of the Christian world in the next 100
years. Islam is intended to dominate all other people and faiths.

Quran
(9:30) - "And the Jews say: Ezra is the son of Allah; and the Christians
say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they
imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how
they are turned away!"

Quran
(9:38-39) - "O ye who believe! what is the matter with you, that, when ye
are asked to go forth in the cause of Allah, ye cling heavily to the earth? Do
ye prefer the life of this world to the Hereafter? But little is the comfort of
this life, as compared with the Hereafter. Unless ye go forth, He will punish
you with a grievous penalty, and put others in your place." This is a
warning to those who refuse to fight, that they will be punished with Hell.

Quran
(9:41) - "Go forth, light-armed and heavy-armed, and strive with your
wealth and your lives in the way of Allah! That is best for you if ye but
knew." See also the verse that follows (9:42)
- "If there had been immediate gain (in sight), and the journey easy, they would
(all) without doubt have followed thee, but the distance was long, (and weighed)
on them" This contradicts the myth that Muslims are to fight only in
self-defense, since the wording implies that battle will be waged a long
distance from home (in another country and on Christian soil, in this case,
according to the historians).

Quran
(9:73) - "O Prophet! strive hard against the unbelievers and the
hypocrites and be unyielding to them; and their abode is hell, and evil is the
destination." Dehumanizing those who reject Islam, by reminding Muslims
that they are merely firewood for Hell, makes it easier to justify slaughter.
It also explains why today's devout Muslims have little regard for those outside
the faith.

Quran
(9:88) - "But the Messenger, and those who believe with him, strive and
fight with their wealth and their persons: for them are (all) good things: and
it is they who will prosper."

Quran
(9:111) - "Allah hath purchased of the believers their persons and their
goods; for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise): they fight in His
cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in truth, through the
Law, the Gospel, and the Quran: and who is more faithful to his covenant than
Allah? then rejoice in the bargain which ye have concluded: that is the
achievement supreme."

Quran
(9:123) - "O you who believe! fight those of the unbelievers who are near
to you and let them find in you hardness."

Quran
(17:16) - "And when We wish to destroy a town, We send Our commandment to
the people of it who lead easy lives, but they transgress therein; thus the word
proves true against it, so We destroy it with utter destruction." Note that
the crime is moral transgression, and the punishment is "utter destruction."
(Before ordering the 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden first issued Americans an
invitation to Islam).

Quran
(18:65-81) - This parable lays the theological groundwork for honor
killings, in which a family member is murdered because they brought shame to the
family, either through apostasy or perceived moral indiscretion. The story
(which is not found in any Jewish or Christian source) tells of Moses
encountering a man with "special knowledge" who does things which don't seem to
make sense on the surface, but are then justified according to later
explanation. One such action is to murder a youth for no apparent reason (74).
However, the wise man later explains that it was feared that the boy would
"grieve" his parents by "disobedience and ingratitude." He was killed so that
Allah could provide them a 'better' son. (Note: This is one reason why honor
killing is sanctioned by Sharia. Reliance of the Traveler (Umdat al-Saliq) says
that punishment for murder is not applicable when a parent or grandparent kills
their offspring (o.1.1-2).)

Quran
(21:44) - "We gave the good things of this life to these men and their
fathers until the period grew long for them; See they not that We gradually
reduce the land (in their control) from its outlying borders? Is it then they
who will win?"

Quran
(25:52) - "Therefore listen not to the Unbelievers, but strive against
them with the utmost strenuousness..." "Strive against" is Jihad -
obviously not in the personal context. It's also significant to point out that
this is a Meccan verse.

Quran
(33:60-62) - "If the hypocrites, and those in whose hearts is a disease,
and the alarmists in the city do not cease, We verily shall urge thee on against
them, then they will be your neighbors in it but a little while. Accursed, they
will be seized wherever found and slain with a (fierce) slaughter." This
passage sanctions the slaughter (rendered "merciless" and "horrible murder" in
other translations) against three groups: Hypocrites (Muslims who refuse to
"fight in the way of Allah" (3:167)
and hence don't act as Muslims should), those with "diseased hearts" (which
include Jews and Christians 5:51-52),
and "alarmists" or "agitators who include those who merely speak out against
Islam, according to Muhammad's biographers. It is worth noting that the victims
are to be sought out by Muslims, which is what today's terrorists do. If this
passage is meant merely to apply to the city of Medina, then it is unclear why
it is included in Allah's eternal word to Muslim generations.

Quran
(47:3-4) - "Those who reject Allah follow vanities, while those who
believe follow the truth from their lord. Thus does Allah set forth form men
their lessons by similitude. Therefore when you meet in battle those who
disbelieve, then smite the necks until when you have overcome them, then make
(them) prisoners," Those who reject Allah are to be subdued in battle. The
verse goes on to say the only reason Allah doesn't do the dirty work himself is
in order to to test the faithfulness of Muslims. Those who kill pass the test.
"But if it had been Allah's Will, He could certainly have exacted retribution
from them (Himself); but (He lets you fight) in order to test you, some with
others. But those who are slain in the Way of Allah,- He will never let their
deeds be lost."

Quran
(47:35) - "Be not weary and faint-hearted, crying for peace, when ye
should be uppermost (Shakir: "have the upper hand") for Allah is with
you,"

Quran
(48:17) - "There is no blame for the blind, nor is there blame for the
lame, nor is there blame for the sick (that they go not forth to war). And whoso
obeyeth Allah and His messenger, He will make him enter Gardens underneath which
rivers flow; and whoso turneth back, him will He punish with a painful doom."
Contemporary apologists sometimes claim that Jihad means 'spiritual
struggle.' Is so, then why are the blind, lame and sick exempted? This verse
also says that those who do not fight will suffer torment in hell.

Quran
(48:29) - "Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. And those with him are
hard (ruthless) against the disbelievers and merciful among themselves"
Islam is not about treating everyone equally. There are two
very distinct standards that are applied based on religious status. Also the
word used for 'hard' or 'ruthless' in this verse shares the same root as the
word translated as 'painful' or severe' in verse 16.

Quran
(61:4) - "Surely Allah loves those who fight in His way" Religion of
Peace, indeed! This is followed by (61:9):
"He it is who has sent His Messenger (Mohammed) with guidance and the
religion of truth (Islam) to make it victorious over all religions even
though the infidels may resist."

Quran
(61:10-12) - "O ye who believe! Shall I lead you to a bargain that will
save you from a grievous Penalty?- That ye believe in Allah and His Messenger,
and that ye strive (your utmost) in the Cause of Allah, with your property and
your persons: That will be best for you, if ye but knew! He will forgive you
your sins, and admit you to Gardens beneath which Rivers flow, and to beautiful
mansions in Gardens of Eternity." This verse was given in battle. It uses
the Arabic word, Jihad.

Quran
(66:9) - "O Prophet! Strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites,
and be stern with them. Hell will be their home, a hapless journey's end."
The root word of "Jihad" is used again here. The context is clearly holy
war, and the scope of violence is broadened to include "hypocrites" - those who
call themselves Muslims but do not act as such.

From the Hadith:

Bukhari
(52:177) - Allah's Apostle said, "The Hour will not be established until
you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will
say. "O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him."

Bukhari
(52:256) - The Prophet... was asked whether it was permissible to attack
the pagan warriors at night with the probability of exposing their women and
children to danger. The Prophet replied, "They (i.e. women and children) are
from them (i.e. pagans)." In this command, Muhammad establishes that it is
permissible to kill non-combatants in the process of killing a perceived enemy.
This provides justification for the many Islamic terror bombings.

Bukhari
(52:220) - Allah's Apostle said... 'I have been made victorious with
terror'

Abu
Dawud (14:2526) - The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said: Three things are
the roots of faith: to refrain from (killing) a person who utters, "There is no
god but Allah" and not to declare him unbeliever whatever sin he commits, and
not to excommunicate him from Islam for his any action; and jihad will be
performed continuously since the day Allah sent me as a prophet until the day
the last member of my community will fight with the Dajjal (Antichrist)

Abu
Dawud (14:2527) - The Prophet said: Striving in the path of Allah (jihad)
is incumbent on you along with every ruler, whether
he is pious or impious

Muslim
(1:33) - the Messenger of Allah said: I have been commanded to fight
against people till they testify that there is no god but Allah, that Muhammad
is the messenger of Allah

Bukhari
(8:387) - Allah's Apostle said, "I have been ordered to fight the people
till they say: 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah'. And if they say
so, pray like our prayers, face our Qibla and slaughter as we slaughter, then
their blood and property will be sacred to us and we will not interfere with
them except legally."

Muslim
(1:30) - "The Messenger of Allah said: I have been commanded to fight
against people so long as they do not declare that there is no god but
Allah."

Bukhari
(11:626) - [Muhammad said:] "I decided to order a man to lead the
prayer and then take a flame to burn all those, who had not left their houses
for the prayer, burning them alive inside their homes."

Muslim
(1:149) - "Abu Dharr reported: I said: Messenger of Allah, which of the
deeds is the best? He (the Holy Prophet) replied: Belief in Allah and Jihad in
His cause..."

Muslim
(20:4645) - "...He (the Messenger of Allah) did that and said: There is
another act which elevates the position of a man in Paradise to a grade one
hundred (higher), and the elevation between one grade and the other is equal to
the height of the heaven from the earth. He (Abu Sa'id) said: What is that act?
He replied: Jihad in the way of Allah! Jihad in the way of Allah!"

Muslim
(20:4696) - "the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: 'One
who died but did not fight in the way of Allah nor did he express any desire (or
determination) for Jihid died the death of a hypocrite.'"

Muslim
(19:4321-4323) - Three separate hadith in which Muhammad shrugs over the
news that innocent children were killed in a raid by his men against
unbelievers. His response: "They are of them (meaning the enemy)."

Muslim
(19:4294) - "When the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) appointed
anyone as leader of an army or detachment he would especially exhort him... He
would say: Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against
those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war... When you meet your enemies
who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to
any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any
harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them
and desist from fighting against them... If they refuse to accept Islam, demand
from them the Jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your
hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah's help and fight them.

Tabari 7:97 The morning after the murder of Ashraf, the Prophet
declared, "Kill any Jew who falls under your power." Ashraf was a poet,
killed by Muhammad's men because he insulted Islam. Here, Muhammad widens the
scope of his orders to kill. An innocent Jewish businessman was then slain by
his Muslim partner, merely for being non-Muslim.

Tabari 9:69 "Killing Unbelievers is a small matter to us" The
words of Muhammad, prophet of Islam.

Tabari 17:187 "'By God, our religion (din) from which we have
departed is better and more correct than that which these people follow. Their
religion does not stop them from shedding blood, terrifying the roads, and
seizing properties.' And they returned to their former religion." The words
of a group of Christians who had converted to Islam, but realized their error
after being shocked by the violence and looting committed in the name of Allah.
The price of their decision to return to a religion of peace was that the men
were beheaded and the woman and children enslaved by the caliph Ali.

Ibn Ishaq/Hisham
327: - “Allah said, ‘A
prophet must slaughter before collecting captives. A slaughtered enemy is driven
from the land. Muhammad, you craved the desires of this world, its goods and the
ransom captives would bring. But Allah desires killing them to manifest the
religion.’”

Ibn Ishaq/Hisham
990: - Lest anyone think that
cutting off someone's head while screaming 'Allah Akbar!' is a modern creation,
here is an account of that very practice under Muhammad, who seems to
approve.

Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 992:
- "Fight everyone in the way
of Allah and kill those who disbelieve in Allah." Muhammad's instructions
to his men prior to a military raid.

Additional Notes:

Other than the fact that Muslims haven't killed every
non-Muslim under their domain, there is very little else that they can point to
as proof that theirs is a peaceful, tolerant religion. Where Islam is dominant
(as in the Middle East and Pakistan) religious minorities suffer brutal
persecution with little resistance. Where Islam is in the minority (as in
Thailand, the Philippines and Europe) there is the threat of violence if Muslim
demands are not met. Either situation seems to provide a justification for
religious terrorism, which is persistent and endemic to Islamic
fundamentalism.

The reasons are obvious and begin with the Quran. Few verses
of Islam's most sacred text can be construed to fit the contemporary virtues of
religious tolerance and universal brotherhood. Those that do are earlier
"Meccan" verses which are obviously abrogated by later ones. This is why Muslim
apologists speak of the "risks" of trying to interpret the Quran without their
"assistance" - even while claiming that it is a perfect book.

Far from being mere history or theological construct, the
violent verses of the Quran have played a key role in very real massacre and
genocide. This includes the brutal slaughter of tens of millions of Hindus for
five centuries beginning around 1000 AD with Mahmud of Ghazni's bloody
conquest. Both he and the later Tamerlane (Islam's Genghis Khan) slaughtered an
untold number merely for defending their temples from destruction. Buddhism was
very nearly wiped off the Indian subcontinent. Judaism and Christianity met the
same fate (albeit more slowly) in areas conquered by Muslim armies, including
the Middle East, North Africa and parts of Europe, including today's Turkey.
Zoroastrianism, the ancient religion of a proud Persian people is despised by
Muslims and barely survives in modern Iran.

So ingrained is violence in the religion that Islam has never
really stopped being at war, either with other religions or with itself.

Muhammad was a military leader, laying siege to towns, massacring
the men, raping
their women, enslaving their children, and taking the property of others as his
own. On several occasions he rejected offers of surrender from the besieged
inhabitants and even butchered captives.
He actually inspired his followers to battle when they did not feel it was right
to fight, promising them slaves and booty if they did and threatening them with
Hell if they did not. Muhammad allowed his men to rape traumatized women
captured in battle, usually on the very day their husbands and family members
were slaughtered.

It is important to emphasize that, for the most part, Muslim
armies waged aggressive campaigns, and the religion's most dramatic
military conquests were made by the actual companions of Muhammad in the decades
following his death. The early Islamic principle of warfare was that the
civilian population of a town was to be destroyed (ie. men executed, women and
children taken as slaves) if they defended themselves. Although modern
apologists often claim that Muslims are only supposed to attack in self-defense,
this is an oxymoron that is flatly
contradicted by the accounts of Islamic historians and others that go back
to the time of Muhammad.

Consider the example of the Qurayza Jews, who were completely
obliterated only five years after Muhammad arrived in Medina. Their leader
opted to stay neutral when their town was besieged by a Meccan army that was
sent to take revenge for Muhammad's deadly caravan raids. The tribe killed no
one from either side and even surrendered peacefully to Muhammad after the
Meccans had been turned back. Yet the prophet of Islam had every male member of
the Qurayza beheaded, and every woman and child enslaved, even raping one of the
captives himself (what Muslim apologists might refer to as "same day
marriage").

One of Islam's most revered modern scholars, Sheikh Yusuf
al-Qaradawi, openly sanctions offensive Jihad: "In the Jihad which you are
seeking, you look for the enemy and invade him. This type of Jihad takes place only when the Islamic state is invading other
[countries] in order to spread the word of
Islam and to remove obstacles standing in its way." Elsewhere, he
notes: "Islam has the right to take the initiative…this is God’s religion and
it is for the whole world. It has the right to destroy all obstacles in the form
of institutions and traditions … it attacks institutions and traditions to
release human beings from their poisonous influences, which distort human nature
and curtail human freedom. Those who say that Islamic Jihad was merely for the
defense of the 'homeland of Islam' diminish the greatness of the Islamic way of
life."

The widely respected Dictionary of Islam
defines Jihad as "A religious war with those who are unbelievers in the
mission of Muhammad. It is an incumbent religious duty, established in the
Qur'an and in the Traditions as a divine institution, and enjoined specially for
the purpose of advancing Islam and of repelling evil from Muslims…[Quoting from
the Hanafi school, Hedaya, 2:140, 141.], "The destruction of the sword is
incurred by infidels, although they be not the first aggressors, as appears
from various passages in the traditions which are generally received to this
effect."

Muhammad's failure to leave a clear line of succession
resulted in perpetual internal war following his death. Those who knew him best
first fought to keep remote tribes from leaving Islam and reverting to their
preferred religion (the Ridda or 'Apostasy wars'). Then, within the closer
community, early Meccan converts battled later ones. Hostility developed
between those immigrants who had traveled with Muhammad to Mecca and the Ansar
at Medina who had helped them settle in. Finally there was a violent struggle
within Muhammad's own family between his favorite wife and favorite daughter - a
jagged schism that has left Shias and Sunnis at each others' throats to this
day.

The strangest and most untrue thing that can be said about
Islam is that it is a Religion of Peace. If every standard by which the West is
judged and condemned (slavery, imperialism, intolerance, misogyny, sexual
repression, warfare...) were applied equally to Islam, the verdict would be
devastating. Islam never gives up what it conquers, be it religion, culture,
language or life. Neither does it make apologies or any real effort at moral
progress. It is the least open to dialogue and the most self-absorbed. It is
convinced of its own perfection, yet brutally shuns self-examination and
represses criticism.

This is what makes the Quran's verses of violence so
dangerous. They are given the weight of divine command. While Muslim
terrorists take them as literally as anything else in their holy book, and
understand that Islam is incomplete without Jihad, moderates offer little to
contradict them - outside of opinion. Indeed, what do they have? Speaking of
peace and love may win over the ignorant, but when every twelfth verse of
Islam's holiest book either speaks to Allah's hatred for non-Muslims or calls
for their death, forced conversion, or subjugation, it's little wonder that
sympathy for terrorism runs as deeply as it does in the
broader community - even if most Muslims personally prefer not to interpret
their religion in this way.

Although scholars like Ibn Khaldun, one of Islam's most
respected philosophers, understood that "the holy war is a religious duty,
because of the universalism of the Muslim mission and (the obligation to)
convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force", many other
Muslims are either unaware or willfully ignorant of the Quran's near absence of
verses that preach universal non-violence. Their understanding of Islam comes
from what they are taught by others. In the West, it is typical for believers
to think that their religion must be like Christianity - preaching the New
Testament virtues of peace, love, and tolerance - because Muslims are taught
that Islam is supposed to be superior in
every way. They are somewhat surprised and embarrassed to learn that the
evidence of the Quran and the bloody history of Islam are very much in
contradiction to this.

Others simply accept the violence. In 1991, a Palestinian
couple in America was convicted of stabbing their daughter to death for being
too Westernized. A family friend came to their defense, excoriating the jury
for not understanding the "culture", claiming that the father was merely
following "the religion" and saying that the couple had to "discipline their
daughter or lose respect." (source).
In 2011, unrepentant Palestinian terrorists, responsible for the brutal murders
of civilians, women and children explicitly in
the name of Allah were treated to a luxurious "holy pilgrimage" to Mecca by the
Saudi king - without a single Muslim voice raised in protest.

For their part, Western liberals would do well not to
sacrifice critical thinking to the god of political correctness, or look for
reasons to bring other religion down to the level of Islam merely to avoid the
existential truth that this it is both different and dangerous.

There are just too many Muslims who take the Quran
literally... and too many others who couldn't care less about the violence done
in the name of Islam.

"All we want is the facts Ma'am" ~Joe Friday

Once again astounding you smear one of my posts with your Superstitious Delusions and Graffiti. So why is it you only seem to be able to Quote half of the "Quran" mixed in with a Judicious amount of the "Bible" as if that nonsense actually meant something?

Terrorists are Terrorists whether they are Christan, Muslim, Jew, or Hindu, even if they are sponsored by the FBI, DHS or CIA they are all the same!

None are so hopelessly enslaved, as those who falsely believe they are free. The truth has been kept from the depth of their minds by masters who rule them with lies. They feed them on falsehoods till wrong looks like right in their eyes.~Johann von Goethe

I've got an Orgone Earth pipe plug with your butt's name on it.

@ Astounding

[Since you've seen fit to reproduce your comment from a previously-published story, I'll reproduce my response to it with some minor corrections. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts.]

A few points:

I. Some of your interpretations of specific quotations are rather suspect.

To whit:

A. You quote 2:191-193 ("And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution [of Muslims] is worse than slaughter [of non-believers]... but if they desist, then lo! Allah is forgiving and merciful. And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah.")

You cite historical context to justify your decision to portray this as an endorsement of aggressive warfare without moderation, but you ignore the textual context. For example, the verse that immediately precedes this quotation (2:190) reads, "And fight in the way of Allah with those who fight with you, and do not exceed the limits, surely Allah does not love those who exceed the limits," and 2:193 reads, ""And fight with them until there is no persecution, and religion should be only for Allah, but if they desist, then there should be no hostility except against the oppressors."

Now you seem to be aware of this verse, because you immediately jump in with the suggestion that this is a mistranslation, and that the words that are rendered with reference to oppression are really speaking of disbelief.

I am not at all persuaded by this argument. Please correct me if I am wrong, but I get the sense that you don't speak Arabic yourself. Neither do I. What I do know is that a quick search of multiple translations shows that the dominant perception among those who do in fact know the language is that this is not a reference to unbelief.

Consider the following translations (the first three are from the page you linked to; the fourth is the first google hit for "koran 2.193" that linked to a translation.

Yusufali: "And fight them on until there is no more Tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in Allah; but if they cease, Let there be no hostility except to those who practise oppression."

Pickthal: "And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah. But if they desist, then let there be no hostility except against wrong-doers."

Shakir: "And fight with them until there is no persecution, and religion should be only for Allah, but if they desist, then there should be no hostility except against the oppressors."

Islam101 dot-com (translator not listed): "Keep on fighting against them until mischief ends and the way prescribed by Allah prevails. But if they desist, then know that hostility is only against the wrong-doers."

As you will note, not one of these translators made any reference to unbelief here. That's not because they're being politically correct, as each of these translations does include many controversial references to unbelievers. My bet would be that none of them translated this in the way that you insist it should be read because that's not actually what it means.

B. Re: Koran 3:56 ("As to those who reject faith, I will punish them with terrible agony in this world and in the Hereafter, nor will they have anyone to help.")

In what sense does this differ at all from what most mainstream Christian churches preach?

C. Re: Koran 4:104

You quote: "And be not weak hearted in pursuit of the enemy; if you suffer pain, then surely they (too) suffer pain as you suffer pain..."

You then pose a question: "Is pursuing an injured and retreating enemy really an act of self-defense?"

I see no textual evidence whatsoever for your extreme interpretation. "Pursuing the enemy" is often used in military contexts in which there's no implication that the enemy is necessarily injured. (In any case, the US military certainly seems to think that such actions are justifiable. See the Collateral Murder video in reference to this.)

II.. "Unfortunately, there are very few verses of tolerance and peace to abrogate or even balance out the many that call for nonbelievers to be fought and subdued until they either accept humiliation, convert to Islam, or are killed. "

This is complete nonsense. There are many verses that appear to call for tolerance. Here is a small sampling:

A. "Say: O unbelievers! I do not serve that which you serve, Nor do you serve Him Whom I serve: Nor am I going to serve that which you serve, Nor are you going to serve Him Whom I serve: You shall have your religion and I shall have my religion." (109: 1-6)

B. "And do not dispute with the followers of the Book except by what is best, except those of them who act unjustly, and say: We believe in that which has been revealed to us and revealed to you, and our God and your God is One, and to Him do we submit." (29:46)

C. "Verily! Those who believe and those who are Jews and Christians, and Sabians, whoever believes in God and the Last Day and do righteous good deeds shall have their reward with their Lord, on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve ."

Do these passages seem to contradict other passages that call for holy war? Of course they do! Show me a religious text that doesn't contain an apparent contradiction!

III. Violence in the Old Testament

That's a partial list of some of the objections that I have to your specific textual interpretations. That being said, I will gladly admit that there are a number of instances in which we find what appear to me to be clear endorsements of actions that I would consider to be completely immoral. And yet I have a very, very hard time accepting your claim that it is an "existential truth that [Islam] is both different [from Judaism and Christianity] and dangerous."

Let's take a look at a very small selection of passages from the Old Testament:

A. Exodus 15:3

"The LORD is a man of war: the LORD is his name."

B. Numbers 31

[This follows the description of God's direct invocation to Moses to lead the Israelites in a war against the Midianites, whose crimes included having caused "a plague among the congregation of the LORD." So the Israelites go to war and beat the Midianites. They slay all adult males, but keep the women and children as captives. Apparently this isn't enough for Moses or for God. Here is the command of the Prophet:]

"Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man." (31:17-18)

C. Deuteronomy 7

When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations—the Hittites, Girga@!$%#es, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you— and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn your children away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you. This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles and burn their idols in the fire. For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession."

D. Crimes worthy of the death penalty according to the Old Testament [a very partial list]:

- disrespecting one's parents

- worshiping idols

- blasphemy

- apostasy

- approaching the tabernacle while the Levites are setting it up

- working on the Sabbath

E. Two examples (out of many) where God personally intercedes to kill people in the Old Testament:

- He sends bears to kill forty-two youths who mock the prophet Elisha's baldness.

- He burns Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu to death for "offering a strange fire before the LORD."

Again, you appear to be aware of these instances, but you brush them aside by arguing that "Unlike nearly all of the Old Testament verses of violence, the verses of violence in the Quran are mostly open-ended, meaning that they are not restrained by the historical context of the surrounding text."

This argument is patently ridiculous (and the linked article is no more convincing). There is absolutely nothing in the Old Testament that suggests that God's endorsement of genocidal wars against unbelievers, slavery, or execution for minor offenses and religious sleights is in any sense conditioned by an exceptional historical context or that God actually opposes acts of extreme violence committed in his name.. And not surprisingly, there are Jewish extremists who, like their Muslim counterparts, interpret these verses as mandating genocide today.

I found the website you linked to (religionofpeace dot com) to be highly disturbing. I see very little difference between the articles I read there and what I've read in "scholarly" analyses of the Talmud published under the Third Reich.

Ah, yes, the peace and grandiosity of delusional stupidity.

Simply put, Islam is poison.

What a convincing post! I especially enjoyed all of the facts, interesting interpretations, and sound conclusions that you reached...

So here's my question for you, Pray Hard: what is your proposed "final solution" to the threat of Islam?

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. ~Mahatma Gandhi

Better said than I ever could!

Impeach Obama in 2012 and Imprison Clinton for Criminal Conspiracy to Cover Up the Murder of an American Ambassador, Intentionally Lying to the American People, Secret CIA Prisons, and illegally providing Aid & Comfort to Al Qaeda in Benghazi-Gate and now in Syria!

When the President does it, that means that it's not illegal. ~Richard M. Nixon

At least Republican President Richard Nixon Had the "Honor" To Resign Afterwards!

Don't get the impression that you arouse my anger. You see, one can only be angry with those he respects. ~Richard M. Nixon

"It was the theme from the 1970s TV series, "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." LaRose imagined herself as the lead character, Mary Richards. If she had been wearing a hat instead of a burka, LaRose thought, she would have stepped from the cab with a huge smile and acted out the show's classic opening, twirling around and tossing her hat in the air."

She's just a stupid deluded idiot. Had she done this in a Muslim country following three steps behind her husband, he most likely would have turned around and beat her down onto the road or embarrassing him and insulting his dignity. So she has a bunch of bad marriages and stuff and switches to a religion where they treat their women like garbage. That makes total sense!

From the article:

"LaRose asked the woman waiting with her in the truck what she thought of Damache. The woman replied that her husband believed LaRose was a lost soul and that Damache had misled her. Perhaps Vilks, the Swedish artist, did deserve to die, but that was up to Allah, not Damache, to decide, she said.

The woman and her husband were the first Muslims LaRose had met who did not advocate violence. They were wonderful, deeply religious people, and they held a starkly different version of Islam than the likes of Eagle Eye and Black Flag."

Now my take on this: These are the "wonderful, deeply religious" Muslims who "did not advocate violence", YET THEY ARE WILLING TO NOT ONLY STAY SILENT BUT TO AID OTHER MUSLIMS IN COMMITTING MURDER! Geesh. If that's the best that Muslims have to offer, they've got nothing!

If they knew that "Black Flag" was plotting murder they had a duty to go to the authorities and turn him in! Religious? My a$$.

obama should just kill the terrorist biotch with a drone strike!.

Wouldn't that be politically incorrect?!

This lady just needs to be swinging from the end of a rope.

To me, all religious are the start of everything. When you rely on something that is written thousands of years ago, you are acting like people thousands of years ago.

You can't use logic or common sense to discuss with religious people. You can't even say anything before they quote the book and it is mind numbing to say anything remotely logical before they shrug off and tell you that "You will burn in hell" for those heathen thought.

I was a Christian for 20 years, born in the 3rd generations Christian family and be baptized at the age of 13. I know more about different religions than most people and as being a zealot myself before, I also know the insanity and delusion of being one.

What these women really needed was some hot and heavy sex. Instead, they got into religious extremism. Make love, not war, people!

1. "Muhammad was a successful but ruthless military leader who was personally responsible for the deaths of thousands. How many other religions had such a leader?"

The Israelites had several such leaders. The Old Testament is chock full of passages that describe genocide and mass enslavement carried out as the direct result of a divine invocation. Have you read it?

Christian leaders during the Middle Ages (and some more recently) also saw their religion as mandating wars that led to countless innocent deaths.

2. "One of his 'wives' was a child, and the Muslim religion, in some countries, still condondons child brides."

After St. Augustine of Hippo had embraced Christian doctrine (but before he was baptized) his devoutly Christian mother Monica arranged a marriage for him with a ten year-old girl. To be fair, Augustine would have had to wait another two years, until she was twelve, because Christians aren't savages like Muslims ;) .

3. "The moderate Muslims may say that they are quiet, peace loving people, however their doctrine states otherwise."

It seems quite clear to me that Christian doctrine unambiguously commands believers to embrace an ethic of radical pacifism and nonresistance to evil. And yet the vast majority of Christians either deemphasize Jesus' commandments to this effect or even openly mock them.

The lesson? The relationship between the seemingly clear messages of a religious text and the actual beliefs of those who claim to follow that religion is far from straightforward.

LevTolstoy2 -- You attempt to equate Christianity with Islam by pointing out parallels between ancient texts, yet you do not acknowledge that the Old Testament is a Pre-Christian text. Christ was said to make a "new covenant", and he supposedly told his followers: "Pray for those who persecute you" (not kill them and all their family).

Personally, I think very few people try to understand the spiritual significance. I am annoyed by so-called Christians who think they know best how to regulate my life. But I'd rather live with a bunch of annoying "christians" than a bunch of murdering Muslims anyday. Please see my rant #1.9.

"You attempt to equate Christianity with Islam by pointing out parallels between ancient texts, yet you do not acknowledge that the Old Testament is a Pre-Christian text."

Where did I "attempt to equate Christianity with Islam by pointing out parallels between ancient texts?" The post that you are responding to made three points:

1. I answered the question posed by the original poster who wrote: "Muhammad was a successful but ruthless military leader who was personally responsible for the deaths of thousands. How many other religions had such a leader?"

I pointed out that at least one religion (Judaism) that is not generally regarded as an evil death cult had a long tradition of fighting wars with religious justifications.

Even though the New Testament appears to me to teach a message of peace, there have also been many Christians who have believed that God either mandates or looks favorably on violent acts committed in his name.

2. Christians who rage against Muhammed's alleged pedophiliac inclinations are being hypocrites. Many of the fathers of the Christian Church (and of other religions) engaged in sexual practices that would be regarded as abhorrent in today's context. Therefore, Islam isn't the exceptional case that the OP makes it out to be.

3. There is quite often a disconnect between what religious texts appear to teach and what religious people actually believe. Just as most Christians ignore a lot of what Jesus said, most Muslims ignore a lot of what Mohammed said. It may not be very valuable for amateur experts on the Koran to weigh in by explaining to actual Muslims what "true Islam" really means by selectively quoting from a text with which they are not particularly familiar. Invariably, these "experts" don't speak any Arabic, but have spent a great deal of time browsing inflammatory websites with pseudo-scholarly pretensions.

That is all I said. If you'd like to respond to it, I'd be more than willing to have a discussion.

LevTolstoy2--

Okay. You got me there. I apologize for not understanding the full context of what you were saying. I basically "skimmed" your comment and replied without studying it in depth.

However, my generalization that you were "equating" the two was triggered by the very defense of Islam you were making by comparing it to Christianity. Even in your reply to my hasty comment, one of the things you say is: "2. Christians who rage against Muhammed's alleged pedophiliac inclinations are being hypocrites. Many of the fathers of the Christian Church (and of other religions) engaged in sexual practices that would be regarded as abhorrent in today's context." Do you understand why I might have used the word "equate" in summarizing your argument?

I was trying to draw attention to my observation from the article in #1.9. Again, I'm not talking about historical or philosophical similarities in the doctrines, but rather the current, modern practice of these religions. Why is it that even "peaceful" Muslims today turn a blind eye to murder and terrorism?

Again, I apologize for generalizing about your comments. In that I was/am wrong. Would you please respond to my other hasty rant in #1.9?

LevTolstoy2 --

By the way, I have seen the post from "astounding" before. I even copied it to another folder so that I could study it in depth later. I thought you might like to know that I just copied your response to astounding (#1.4) to the same folder. When I get around to studying this in depth, I will have your words to review as well.

Apology accepted. I've been guilty of that before, so I'll gladly let it slide. (But please don't skim this one :) )

1. No, I don't think you're completely off when you speak of "equating," although I don't think that applies to my comments re: Muhammed and St. Augustine. All I was pointing out there was how ridiculously hypocritical it is for Christians to apply modern standards of sexual morality to Muhammed while completely excusing the actions of their own saints and prophets.

But back to the issue of equating religious traditions... My thoughts on this are a little bit complex (or vague if you prefer!), but I'll say this:

I don't consider myself to be a Jew, Christian, or Muslim, but I'm also not a person who reflexively dismisses religion or religiosity. As an outside observer who is hardly an expert on any of these traditions, my general feeling is that the holy texts themselves aren't "equal" (based, of course, on my own personal standards).

Generally speaking, I find great portions of the Old Testament to be absolutely abhorrent, although I certainly see great wisdom and beauty in other parts. I far prefer the New Testament, and especially the gospels. To my mind, a great deal of the rest of the New Testament is not so much repellant as it is irrelevant and unconvincing. Paul has some interesting things to say, but a great deal of his writings respond to concerns of an audience who had a very different worldview, and some of the things he says are unconvincing and unappealing. The Book of Revelations is interesting to me as a historical/literary document, but I think it has the potential to inspire people to great evil if they take it as a literal blueprint for the apocalypse.

The Koran is the text that I've spent the least amount of time studying. Some of it strikes me as spiritually inspiring, but in general it seems to me to be very much the product of a violent tribal context, much like the Old Testament. There are certainly a great deal of passages that strike me as crazy and scary.

If I had to make a ranking, I'd say that I like the New Testament the most, and that I have a very similar appraisal of the Koran and the Old Testament.

So no, I don't think that all the texts are equal.

But when I look at how people who call themselves Jews, Christians, and Muslims conduct themselves, then I don't really see much of a difference at all. All three groups have seen radical movements that seized on the really awful parts of their religious traditions and deemphasized the good and spiritually nourishing components. All three have had no problem completely ignoring the people they call prophets and messiahs. Sometimes this works out for the better-- I'm glad that most Muslims don't think they ought to wage holy wars against nonbelievers-- and sometimes it works out for the worse-- I know very few Christians who take Christ's commandment to turn the other cheek seriously.

That being said, it's quite clear that at the present moment, a disproportionate amount of religiously justified violence is being committed in the name of Islam. But I think that has a lot more to do with broader political, cultural, and historical particularities than with the essential nature of Islam itself. (I can say more about that, but it's a pretty complex question and I'd just as soon get on to responding to your "hasty rant.")

2. Re: your hasty rant

You are absolutely correct to point out these peoples' moral culpability in failing to take concrete measures to stop a planned murder. But I think that you are mistaken when you take them as more or less representative of moderate Muslims as a whole. (That's a point that you didn't make explicitly, but it's how I read your comment-- correct me if I'm wrong here.)

What I would say is this: a person who is curious about Islam and decides to attend services at a local mosque in the suburbs of America will encounter very, very different people than a person who decides to explore their religious leanings by posting on jihadist websites. I don't think this is unique to Islam. If I were to explore Christianity by talking to the priest at the local Catholic Priest I would get a very different picture than if I consulted the guy who stands outside the library shouting about fornicators and the fires of hell.

The point is that a "moderate" in one community will be an extremist in another. This couple sounds like they could be regarded as "moderate extremists."

It kind of annoys me when people complain about moderate Muslims' alleged failures to denounce terrorism. Moderate Muslims have been outspoken on this issue; many, many clerics and organizations responded to the 9/11 attacks with unequivocal condemnation. The fact of the matter is that American Muslims are, as a whole, well-educated, prosperous, and religiously moderate. They are also more likely to reject the legitimacy of violence to solve political conflicts than are self-identified Christians. I have no idea what anyone hopes to gain by constantly telling a relatively moderate group of people that the true version of their religion tells them that they should wage war against us.

Finally, I'll say this: there are somewhere around 1.6 billion Muslims in the world. That's a huge amount of people, and as with any large group there is a significant minority that want to behave like jerks. That's not a "Muslim problem." It's a human problem, and It seems pretty incredible to all Muslims accountable for the actions of their 1.6 billion co-religionists.

One last post before I turn it in for tonight.

First, I thank you for accepting my apology.

Second, I have known (some) Muslims, and some of them were good people, some were not. One guy ( if I remember correctly, his name was Edmir), had integrity and honor that was to be admired. He was from Bosnia and many of his family had been killed by so-called Christians. But when I would ask him about this he would say that the Christians in Bosnia that killed his family were not the same type of Christians in America.

Third, I like everything you said except the part at the very end where you seem to say that Christians are more violent than Muslims. Let me just do a cut and paste quote: "The fact of the matter is that American Muslims are, as a whole, well-educated, prosperous, and religiously moderate. They are also more likely to reject the legitimacy of violence to solve political conflicts than are self-identified Christians."

Now, you write a lot, and I'm hoping that this statement is just a hastily written comment that you really didn't mean to convey as it comes across to me. I know a lot of American "Christians" who are uneducated fools, and I also know a lot of American Christians who are very sincere and caring individuals, and much better people than I am.

I think it would be best if people could adopt a new religion of caring for each other and not devote so much time to following archaic manuscripts or praying to idols such as a meteorite.

Anyway, the only thing we should not reject about religion is the love for each other that it makes us feel inside.

Peace be with you, my brother.

I should have clarified that statement. Here's what I was referring to:

"New data from polling firm Gallup shows that out of all the religious groups in the U.S., Muslims are most likely to reject violence, followed by the non-religious atheists and agnostics.
"Through interviews with 2,482 Americans, Gallup found that 78 percent of Muslims believe violence which kills civilians is never justified, whereas just 38 percent of Protestant Christians and 39 percent of Catholics agreed with that sentiment. Fifty-six percent of atheists answered similarly.

When Gallup put the question a bit more pointedly, asking if it would be justified for “an individual person or a small group of persons to target and kill civilians,” the responses were a bit more uniform. Respondents from nearly all groups were widely opposed to such tactics, with Protestants and Catholics at 71 percent against. Muslims still had the highest number opposed, at 89 percent. Seventy-six percent of atheists were also opposed.

The Gallup survey, conducted over the course of a year, was designed to measure religious and non-religious attitudes toward violence 10 years after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001."

(Of course, this survey was about American Muslims. I'll readily admit that radical Islam is a bigger problem in Europe and the Middle East.)

"Peace be with you, my brother"
And with you.

I've known plenty so called "christian" people, that were just terrible self centered individuals who acted/talked in ways that went totally against what Jesus taught.

Should I throw ALL Christians in a the same box, because some of them are hypocritical/judgemental azzes?

Don't forget Catholic bishop tried to take over England several times and on top of the politic game.

This reminds me ways to get into power.

1. Subjugate everyone and rule with an Iron Fist.

2. Treat everyone fairly and hope they bring you to power.

3. In the name of God, you are the voice of God, the one who carry God's word to the masses.

The 3rd one is the easiest to get into power since even if you do something wrong, who dare to speak up against God?

1. "Mohammed probably didn't even exist as an historical person. He was probably nothing more than a concoction by story tellers of the time, just like all mythic characters."

I am not aware of a single credible historian or religious scholar who believes that Mohammed did not exist. I have no idea what leads you to make such a ridiculous claim.

2. "For you "old holy book" thumpers, let it go. It doesn't matter what some old books say. The issue is not what they say or write or what is written in some old book. The issue is ... what are Muslims doing?"

Your logic is extremely convoluted. Insofar as Muslims believe that their relationship to this particular book is what makes them as Muslims, the question of what it says and (perhaps more importantly) how it is interpreted does indeed "matter."

3. "Well, maybe most of them are essentially benign; however, by being so, they de facto support the jihadis by not stamping them out."

More bizarre logic. I assume that there are a lot of Lutherans who wouldn't appreciate being told that their failure to "stamp out" the Westboro Baptists constitutes "de facto support." I think that you would probably resent it if I told you that your personal failure to "stamp out" child prostitution makes you a "de facto supporter" of the rape of children.

4. "Think of this ... if only 1% of Muslims are "radical", that's around 15,000,000 (fifteen million) jihadis on the planet. There are only fourteen million Jews on the planet! Even if it's just one tenth of one percent, that's one and a half million jihadis on the planet. Every day we see the scourge of these few or many. From every corner of the Earth Muslim violence is an every day occurrence."

That is indeed scary. But think of this: it has been suggested that roughly 4% of the population can be characterized as sociopaths. So that means that you live in a country with 12 million sociopaths. There's also a small but significant percentage of the American population who are not sociopaths but who have violent criminal tendencies. And wouldn't you agree that "every day we see the scourge" of these people or that "from every corner of the Earth" human "violence is an ever day occurrence?" It seems to me that you've done little more than point out that Muslims are humans, and that some commit violent acts.

Now one could make the argument-- and some people have-- that Islam is an inherently violent religion. But that would require you to concede that what the Koran says and how people relate to it is indeed a serious issue and not one that can be dismissed by saying that "it doesn't matter what some old books say."

5. "Islam is a dead end street to nowhere. It has no answers. It has nothing to give and doesn't, it only takes. It blood sacrifices its followers. Death and poisoned minds are its calling card. It is the death cult of all death cults. This is the 21st century, it is medieval, at best. It comes from the days of human sacrifice and cannibalism and is still there. Let it go people. Don't rationalize it. Don't apologize for it. Don't explain it. It won't get better. It won't change. It will never be civilized. It will never be compatible with our values, our constitution, our freedom, our Enlightenment principles that founded our country."

Islam is death and poison. It's just that simple."

So, you've now concluded that Islam is an evil death cult on the basis of the acts of what you concede are a minority of those who consider themselves Muslims. So tell me: how do we rid ourselves of this poison in a way that accords with the "Enlightenment principles that founded our country?"

All prophets, saviors, gods, goddesses, deities are myth, plain and simple. Furthermore, I don't care what you think. I can't tell whether you're a Muslim, a troll, an apologist, a fool or what.

So were Joseph Smith and Brigham Young also fictional characters who never existed in history? And I'm the fool?

Believe what you will. It's your life. If you want to believe in fairy tales, go for it.

I'm not a Mormon, so I don't believe that Joseph Smith or Brigham Young were divinely-inspired prophets.

I'm also not a fool, so I don't believe that they were fictional characters.

What possible objection could you have to that?

Wow, that's really funny. I know many Muslims, and not a single one of them has endorsed violence or ever mentioned being called a hypocrite by other Muslims. I imagine the Muslims that one encounters living an everyday peaceful existence differ significantly than those one meets through jihadist websites.

Wow, that's really funny.

Tragic, really. But it's the word of Allah. And I don't think your Muslim friends would want to be known as munafiq either, but you read what Allah had to say about them. And there are plenty more of their devout brethren that do preach Islam inspired violence, I see no humor in it.

Oh, but let's look at the bright side; perhaps your Muslim friends are playing the pity-me card, which is an insideous method of jihad in its own. Allah will know what they have in their hearts, hopefully we don't find out it's bad after it's too late for us to do anything about it. At the very least these so-called moderate Muslims and their defenders are enablers when they pretend there is something other than a violence and intrigue driven Islam.

How is it "tragic?" What would be tragic is if all of the people who considered themselves to be Muslims believed the things that you argue they ought to.

"Oh, but let's look at the bright side; perhaps your Muslim friends are playing the pity-me card, which is an insideous method of jihad in its own."

No, I think most of my Muslim friends are playing the "try to be a decent person by going to work every day and contributing to the day-to-day functioning of the community card," just like most Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, and agnostics that I know. They are about as concerned with waging jihad as my Catholic friends are with combatting the Protestant heresy of consubstantiation.

"At the very least these so-called moderate Muslims and their defenders are enablers when they pretend there is something other than a violence and intrigue driven Islam."

So let me get this straight: you are claiming that people who consider themselves Muslims and do not advocate violence are "pretending" that it is possible to consider oneself a Muslim and not advocate violence?

You are acting as if there is such a thing as "the true Islam," which inevitably coincides with the version preached by the most vile extremists. You think that an interpretation of the Koran that is both literal and selective is the essential core of Islam and you simply dismiss those Muslims who do not share this view as deluded or deceptive.

The fact of the matter is that it is not at all unusual when individuals' religious conceptions appear to flatly contradict the seemingly straightforward commands that we find in their holy texts. Jesus Christ tells us quite clearly to not resist evil and to turn the other cheek. It seems to me that the vast majority of Christians more or less ignore this idea. Are you suggesting that they aren't really Christians? The Old Testament tells the Jews to do all sorts of crazy things, many of which have been completely abandoned by modern Jews. Are they not really Jews?

LevTolstoy2, you try to find logic where is does not exist. Orgainized religeon follows not much rational thought. The original ideas were twisted to justify their own leader's ideology.

I've figured out that lev is a Muslim or dhimmi leftist troll. No sense in even responding to his/her b*llsh*t. He/she believes that taqiyya is the way into our hearts and minds, rather than simply becoming civilized.

Islam is poison.

Precisely. And since there are many leaders in Islam, there are many, many conceptions of "the true meaning" of the Koran.

Sorry, that "precisely" was in response LiarsinPolitics, not to Pray Hard's uncivil and inaccurate rant.

@ Lev

How is it "tragic?" What would be tragic is if all of the people who considered themselves to be Muslims believed the things that you argue they ought to.

I'm not arguing Muslims ought to believe anything. I'm showing you what their God commands them to believe -- and what he prescribes for their punishment if they don't. And there are enough Muslims who do believe what their God commands them to believe and do to make the situation tragic.

Go, Spot!

However, religion is poison. Islam is plutonium.

You win the "Idiot of the Day" award for this comment.

Modern atheism is the second least tolerant of the religions.

DL, it's called faith. If you have a degree in microbiology (which you don't) the chances of evolving a species like homosapiens are astronomically out of the question.

MPA, atheism is not a religion. You only think it's a religion because that's the limit of your ability to think. You creotard's minds are simply too small.

That is the stupidest thing I've ever read. Everything you said has been refuted and disproven thousands of times. Get an education.

You about as intelligent as a football bat.

Look in the mirrior Liars . You libs are mostly a bunch of terrorist sympathizers .

A very cursory glance at the evidence suggested that the number of people who were actually executed by the Spanish Inquisition was in the low thousands. Therefore, one could say that American murderers kill more people every year than the Spanish Inquisition ever did.
There are roughly 1.6 billion Muslims. If you actually take the rationalist position that you've adopted with regard to evolution, then I'll think you'll agree that there are two questions here:

1. Are Muslims more prone to violence than any other randomly selected sample of 1.6 billion people?

2. If yes, to what extent are distinctly Islamic religious factors responsible for this?

If you have any serious thoughts on that, I'd be glad to discuss them. Simply shouting about Islam being poison won't do.

(Oh, and by the way: "troll" does not mean a person who happens to disagree with you.)

T

American Lobo... I am a Christian. I would ask you to study the killing episodes in the bible. began with the first. Ask where God stood on it or them and what was the motivation.

The God of the bible never created the human being to see it destroyed. Killing is an acting out of a deficient human being, either lacking in correct peer support and/or a person not being able to process critical information...