[Skybird]

Originally Posted by onelifecrisis

@Skybird

You openly admit that there is a difference of opinion among Muslim's as to what exactly is and is not Islam, and you have the audacity to state that you have determined exactly what Islam is and is not, to the point that you will even attempt to persuade those Muslims who will listen of the merit of your perspective! You say, "I have travelled, and read books, and so I know what Islam is really about - in fact, I know it better than the Muslims do!" WTF? And all the while you fail to realise the arrogance and hypocrisy in your stance?

Whether you like it or not, I make my own understanding of it the standard of my acting and opinion-forming, since I have a brain and thus intend to use it. I am capable to give the reasons why I think in this way, and no other way, and I do not see you bringing up convincing reasons why I have to revalue my basis. That others do not agree with me cannot be the deciding argument for me to give up my own opinion, if I do not see the reasons why I came to this opinion being falsified and being shown as wrong.

It makes little sense to refer to the great flood or the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in order to illustrate the content of the sermon on the mountain. Obviously, the tone of both things, the image of that deity behind them, could not be any more different. The Quran compares to the old testament, and to orthodox Judaism, it seems to me. jesus introduced a new understanding of the image and concept of good. His god is more a metaphor, and is different to that tyrannic bloodhound the old god in the old testament is. - you do not see such changes introduced in muhammad's teachings, with before him and after him no other form of Islam or Quranic teaching having been. And to be exact, before Jesus the "Christ", there was no Christianity as well. The church refers to all the bible, yes. and right this contradiction is why I always differ between the teachings of Jesus, and the church. And that I do for very precise and legitmiate reasons even if they oppose the populistic messing up of terms.

And could you at least try to post without needing to fall back to harsh language like "from your a###" and "WTF" and "pr!ck" etc. It makes it annoying to deal with you and throws a bad light on you as well, giving an impression that you are just some juvenile in his teen years not being able to control his hormones. We are no close friends knowing each other since schooldays and sitting together and being drunk at the bar.

Take for example the part of your post where you compare Jesus with Mohammed, in which you explicitly declare the contents of the Bible to be null and void in order to make your point about Christianity... then compare that to your insistance that the full contents of the Qu'ran must be considered when evaluating Islam.

I did not compare "churchian christianity" or the bible and islam there, I did compare Muhammad's and Jesus' life as being known to us, and the preachings that go back to them. Neither did Muhammad author the abrahamic religion of the Jews (he just copied it and altered it to fit his intentions), nor did Jesus create the content of the old testament. Jesus is being called "the Risen, the Christ", and that is where the term "Christianity" comes from. He was a non-violent revolutionery, because he introduced a new concept of what "god" means that is totally different to the conception before him. The old testament has more to do with the old abrahamic religion of the Jews, than with Jesus' teachings. And that is the reason why the old testament is showing as many examples of hate and intolerance and calls for murder and genocide as does the old abrahamic religion and does the Quran. The four gosples went beyond this stage - the Quran never did. In the first two or three centuries after Muhammad's death, there were several different versions of the Quran, which hat undergone local manipulations by local rulers that wanted to use it to justify their own power, but these changes were cosmetically as much as we know, and finally one binding version of the Quran was decided on which in principle is the one that reflects the collection of Muhammad's quotes and sermons (he did not write it himself) until today. The Hadith has seen greater changes in volume and content, and fluctuated massively from up to an estmated I think 280 thousand quotes to as few as just 3 or 4 thousand, because the Hadith canon does not deal with the basics of Islam, but give a guiding line for practical problems and challenges of more prgamatic life and politics, also it's content does not orginally refer back to the mouth of muhammad. Maybe one could say that the Hadith and Sharia compare to the Quran like law codes compare to a constitution, but I am a bit hesitent to really put it that way since there is no separation between politics and religion in islam.

is your "logic" inconsistent, it's also just plain silly both fronts, since neither Christians nor Muslims follow their holy books to the letter.

You have not understood the argument correctly. I compared the content of Jesus and muhammad's preachings, becasue this is what decides how the ideology of Islam and christianity must be understood if you want to talk about the ideology indeed, not about something else you just happen to have on your mind or have been told by a church or a sectarian leader. And I pointed out that the content of Muhammad's preachings was how to legitimise the use of force and violence to defend his conquests and aggressions, while Jesus obviously preached anything but such things. islam did not form tyrannies and violent opressive governments and did not go on conquest in violation but in explicit following of Muhammad's demands and teachings. The church, the crusaders turned violent, oppressive and barbaric in explicit violation of Jesus' teachings. Two totally different ways to come to the violence and intolerance you see in the church, and islam.

I'm sure you well know that there's some pretty disturbing stuff written in the Bible. An outsider could easily read that stuff and conclude that we're all freaking bonkers, and start trying to persuade us of his point of view and campaign to stop churches being built... and eventually some pr!ck claiming to be Christian might get annoyed and send him a death threat. It doesn't prove anything other than that guy is a pr!ck.

See above. What do I care for the terror god of the old "Abrahamism", none at all I care. It's the same brutal face in orthodox Judaism, the old testament, and islam. To hell with all three of them.

the point is: we have moved beyond that stage of literal believing bloodthirsty hear-say, a move expressed in the existence of the four gospels, the reformation, and the enlightenment. There are no parallels to these three historic facts in islamic tradition. It still is bogged down with the old testament, so to speak. In other words, it still is stuck with it'S head in history, 1400 years deep. Back then, Arbaia was far superior to the dark continent of medieval europe, and by all reason they should have become what later eurpope turned out to be. But in the 300 years after muhammad, something swictched, they lost their civilisational lead, their dynmaic for scientific invention, while europe won in pace of developement, anf finally overtook them and became the dominant global civilisation. I thinkn there is a good chnace that wiothiout Muhzammad, it would have gone the other way around, at least Arabia being en par with europe of the past era (obviously europe is past it's cultural climax nowadays ). that's how it goes, it's a cionstant up and down. But sometimes the phase can be short, and oemtime long. Islam locked down it's vitim societies for a VERY long time, it seems.

People are not defined by what it says in a book, nor by the teachings of prophets. If that were the case then Christians would be defined by forgiveness and we both know that's a load of bollocks.

Read again what in an earlier post I said on why the ideology nevertheless causes effects by group dynamics.

Anyhow. This thread has already going on for too long, and I am a bit tired to get in parts ignored, and in other parts being expected to repeat myself time and again, or to just correct the way I get quoted by others.