Islam

[jeffrey smith]

side note here: the "Renaissance" as usually dated was in the fifteenth-sixteenth centuries CE, and the Enlightenment was an 18th century phenomenon--in other words, no more than 200 or 300 years between them. Aquinas was squarely Medieval.

And scholars now recognize a Carolingian renaissance (meaning during the times of Charlemagne and his immediate successors) and a twelfth century CE renaissance of which Aquinas was one of the eventual results.

Also, while religious toleration began during the 17th century CE, separation of Church and State, a rather different thing, was an American invention and one that did not take root in Europe until the 19th century CE or even later. It took Europeans a long time to get used to the idea that one faith could peaceably coexist with other faiths (and even then, at first it was only a comity extended to fellow Christians); but the idea that one does need to be a member of the established religion of the realm in order to exercise full political rights took even longer. The nineteenth century was half way over before the first non-Christian (a Jew, one of the Rothschilds) was allowed to be a sitting member of Parliament, and another generation before the first non-Christian (again, a Jew, not coincidentally, son of the just mentioned first non-Christian MP)was admitted to the House of Lords. Catholics in the UK did not recieve full political rights until 1830; and even today members of the British royal family can not marry Catholics without losing their rights as royalty, while the marital history of the House of Windsor was dramatically impacted by the fact that the monarch is still legal head of the Church of England.

And that's just England, despite its history as leading the way in political rights compared to the Continent...

Jeffrey S.

[dan2100]

side note here: the "Renaissance" as usually dated was in the fifteenth-sixteenth centuries CE, and the Enlightenment was an 18th century phenomenon--in other words, no more than 200 or 300 years between them. Aquinas was squarely Medieval.

And scholars now recognize a Carolingian renaissance (meaning during the times of Charlemagne and his immediate successors) and a twelfth century CE renaissance of which Aquinas was one of the eventual results.

Yes, this is true. And there is a slight mirroring of this -- though it's a bit different -- in things like different Enlightenments -- such as the English, Scottish, French, and German Enlightenments. This is a bit different because the Carolingian Renassaince was separated by a big span of time from the 12th century CE one, whereas the various Enlightenment movements were much more interconnected.

It's also true that what's usually called the Renaissance -- the one usually thought of as extending from the fifteenth century -- proceeded at different times in different places with the Italian one usually coming first and the English one later on.

Anyhow, it just shows how these were fairly complicated affairs -- not a simple unified movement like a bunch of radicals sitting around in a pub crafted a manifesto one day and made a clean break with all that came before them.

Also, while religious toleration began during the 17th century CE, separation of Church and State, a rather different thing, was an American invention and one that did not take root in Europe until the 19th century CE or even later. It took Europeans a long time to get used to the idea that one faith could peaceably coexist with other faiths (and even then, at first it was only a comity extended to fellow Christians); but the idea that one does need to be a member of the established religion of the realm in order to exercise full political rights took even longer. The nineteenth century was half way over before the first non-Christian (a Jew, one of the Rothschilds) was allowed to be a sitting member of Parliament, and another generation before the first non-Christian (again, a Jew, not coincidentally, son of the just mentioned first non-Christian MP)was admitted to the House of Lords. Catholics in the UK did not recieve full political rights until 1830; and even today members of the British royal family can not marry Catholics without losing their rights as royalty, while the marital history of the House of Windsor was dramatically impacted by the fact that the monarch is still legal head of the Church of England.

And that's just England, despite its history as leading the way in political rights compared to the Continent...

That pretty much fits my view. We should also remember that though Christians in Western Europe took a long time to learn religious tolerance -- and this can be traced back to Antiquity; the Ancient Christians were really intolerant of each other once they had political power -- this does not seem to have been as much the case with Muslims. In fact, part of the success of Muslim conquests in places like Egypt and Syria seem due to certain Christian sects preferring Muslim rule over persecution by other Christians -- which seems to tell that they felt the former were relatively more tolerant. (Of course, this doesn't mean they were tolerant in the modern sense of the word.)

[Leonid]

Dan: “I'm only asking that you don't oversimplify too much here -- in the sense of seeing a simple progression from Renaissance to Enlightenment to the things most of us seem to like about Western culture and philosophy.”

Cannot see your point. I never said that it was straight path from Aquinas to renaissance to Enlightenment. I also have no intention to write comprehensive thesis in order to cover 500 years of Western history on this thread. My claim is very simple: Aquinas’ ideas beget renaissance movement, although it took about 250 years to born; renaissance and Enlightenment created philosophical, cultural and political basis for separation of state and church. If you think I’m wrong, then say so and prove it. BTW, tolerance and separation of state and church is not sine qua none. Tolerance is cultural phenomenon; separation is political process which transfers religious affairs from state to the private institutions and individuals. By doing so, separation removes from the church political power. It is difficult to conduct auto-da-fe or jihad as private enterprise.

Edited March 31, 2010 by Leonid

[dan2100]

Dan: “I'm only asking that you don't oversimplify too much here -- in the sense of seeing a simple progression from Renaissance to Enlightenment to the things most of us seem to like about Western culture and philosophy.”

Cannot see your point. I never said that it was straight path from Aquinas to renaissance to Enlightenment. I also have no intention to write comprehensive thesis in order to cover 500 years of Western history on this thread. My claim is very simple: Aquinas’ ideas beget renaissance movement, although it took about 250 years to born; renaissance and Enlightenment created philosophical, cultural and political basis for separation of state and church. If you think I’m wrong, then say so and prove it. BTW, tolerance and separation of state and church is not sine qua none. Tolerance is cultural phenomenon; separation is political process which transfers religious affairs from state to the private institutions and individuals. By doing so, separation removes from the church political power. It is difficult to conduct auto-da-fe or jihad as private enterprise.

That was exactly not my point. My point was more that Aquinas was part and had an impact on Late Middle Ages thought and in some ways the Renaissance, at least part of it, is a repudiation of the Late Middle Ages -- in particular, of some of the good things about the Late Middle Ages. This doesn't mean the Renaissance was an unmitigated evil; rather, it was a mixed bag. Politically, though, it was actually probably much more statist -- and, therefore, from a libertarian/Objectivist perspective, pretty bad -- than what preceded it. Thinkers like Bodin built the groundwork for absolutist rule -- something that, in my readings, seems utterly alien to the Medieval or Late Medieval mind.

So, in that sense, a simple linear progression from Aquinas to the Renaissance to the Enlightenment to separation of Church and State hides some very important retrograde moves. One might even say that the rise of national churches in the Reformation fostered a closer link between Church and State -- especially since Protestant churches were, in many cases, no longer competing with political authorities. During the Middle Ages, the competition between the Church and State in the West, in my opinion, led to there being many limits on both -- a sort of rivalrous situation between two very powerful elites that the Reformation partly helped to undermine by getting rid of the rivalry.

Let me try this again. It's not like there's a crooked path between these periods -- which still views each period as progressive in most or all respects. It's rather that each period has bad elements too -- and some pretty bad ones arose in the Renaissance, in my view, espeically if one is looking at this from the angle of political philosophy.

One might also note the rebirth of Platonism in the Renaissance. That alone should make Objectivists see the Renaissance as a mixed blessing...

Maybe another analogy will help: The Soviets sure helped to get rid of the old aristocratic order and spread atheism. Would you praise them as children of the Enlightenment and look at this as a clear path from the Enlightenment to Soviet rule to a free society? (Granted, we have yet to see that in Russia, but the same holds true everywhere else, no?)

[Leonid]

Dan, apparently we are talking here about two different things. You describe the course of history and I’m talking about ideas which defined this course. Without any doubt, all these ideas were based on mixed premises and therefore history took very convoluted course (as it’s happening today). Nevertheless the end-result of this process was separation of state and church. Your analogy with communist Russia is not accurate: they didn’t spread atheism; they simply substituted religion based on mysticism of mind by religion based on mysticism of muscle (communism). Actually in communist Russia Orthodox church unofficially became a part of the state’s structure, its political maid.

[dan2100]

Dan, apparently we are talking here about two different things. You describe the course of history and I'm talking about ideas which defined this course. Without any doubt, all these ideas were based on mixed premises and therefore history took very convoluted course (as it's happening today). Nevertheless the end-result of this process was separation of state and church. Your analogy with communist Russia is not accurate: they didn't spread atheism; they simply substituted religion based on mysticism of mind by religion based on mysticism of muscle (communism). Actually in communist Russia Orthodox church unofficially became a part of the state's structure, its political maid.

I thought we were talking, broadly, about the influence of religion or of religious ideas on history. After all, isn't your contention that Muslims will, because of their religious ideas, be more violent and even a danger to civilization? If this is so, then one must take into account historical data to see if the believed causal path is indeed confirmed. My contention is, for the most part, it isn't -- specifically, as I said elsewhere, scriptural or ideological determinism are false and looking at scriptures or ideology can tell us everything about how people will act.

Regarding mixed premises, that might explain some things here, but then it's up to you to show why Muslims do not have similar mixed premises when compared to members of other religious groups. After all, the goal here is not to explain the behavior of some hypothetically consistent person of religion X. Such only exist in the social theorists mind and are only of value if they tell us something about how real people will act.

In this vein, I believe I shown that the reasons why separation of Church and State happened, if they happened at all, in the West are far different from your beliefs here. The actual history doesn't follow the path you believe it did: religious people, it seems, learned to live with each other not because of Renaissance -- but because the bloody conflicts following the Reformation and the rise of the nation state seems to have given them pause about killing each other among other things. This seems especially true of the Thirty Years War -- which, it seems to me, threatened to depopulate parts of Central Europe.

Now, I don't want to go overboard with this explanation either. Some Christians in an earlier didn't seem to have much problem with wiping out the Cathars leading almost to depopulating certain areas. So, some of what you say is true: there must have been a change in thinking and morals regarding whether it was right to exterminate people simply because of religious disagreements. (That said, I'd be careful about reading this from the moral, political, and social ideals I admire to actual influences on people. In this case, it might have more because the various sides in these conflicts were able to inflict damage on each that gave pause -- rather than some abstract ideal of tolerance taking root; whereas, in an earlier time, the sides were so unequal that the exterminators had little fear of being exterminated, so felt no need for any moral reciprocity.)

Add to this, actual Renaissance political and social theory seems to have ideologically armed people for religious conflict rather than made them more tolerant. Renaissance political thought was, in some ways, a continuation of absolutist ideology already starting in the Late Middle Ages -- as shown by Murray Rothbard in his book on the history of economic thought. (I thank Jeff Riggenbach for reading passages on this -- see http://mises.org/media/4785 -- for reminding me of Rothbard's views on this. I read the book a few years ago and highly recommend it.) So, if there's a case for ideological influence, one has to explain why ideology appeared to be going the opposite direction of tolerance.

(Also, for any conservative Christians reading, it can't have been Christianity alone because Christians -- at least, some of them -- proved quite adept at systematically persecuting and even exterminating members of rival religions -- even rival sects of Christianity, such as the basic wiping out of pagan religions throughout Europe, the various persecutions of Jews and other Christians (e.g., Copts) from Ancient times on down, and the wiping out of natives in the New World. In some cases, of course, Christians argued against such things, but the people carrying them out often justified them in religious terms and seemed to have experience no moral qualms -- certain none based on their religion -- with these policies.)

Regarding the Soviet example, I didn't use "religion," but "atheism" and one thing seems certain, whether or not the Soviet ideology was a religion, it was atheist in that it had no God. My point in using this example was not be pendantic, but rather to show how mixed outcomes can come about. I could've discussed how the Soviets spread literacy -- though, no doubt, it was spreading before them and it's true that they mainly spread it to spread their control and not to free people up to read whatever they (the various people subject to the Soviet elite) pleased.

[Leonid]

Dan "After all, isn't your contention that Muslims will, because of their religious ideas, be more violent and even a danger to civilization?"

Not at all. In all my posts I have claimed that Islam is militant and violent only because it has strong connections with the structures of political powers (states or pseudo-states). No matter how violent Islamic religious writings are, Islamists would be powerless without this support. Christian writings are all about love and nothing but love, but Christian history is a history of endless carnage and bloodshed.

In regard to your other claim: if ideas of deism and Enlightenment weren't responsible for separation of state and church, which ideas in your opinion were?

[dan2100]

Dan "After all, isn't your contention that Muslims will, because of their religious ideas, be more violent and even a danger to civilization?"

Not at all. In all my posts I have claimed that Islam is militant and violent only because it has strong connections with the structures of political powers (states or pseudo-states). No matter how violent Islamic religious writings are, Islamists would be powerless without this support.

Okay, that did not seem to me to be your contention from your earlier posts.

Christian writings are all about love and nothing but love, but Christian history is a history of endless carnage and bloodshed.

Which Christian writings? Certainly, they are not only "about love and nothing but love..." Are you reading them selectively for the parts on love? One could do the same for any religion's sacred texts and commentaries.

In regard to your other claim: if ideas of deism and Enlightenment weren't responsible for separation of state and church, which ideas in your opinion were?

I was actually initially, if my memory's correct, talking about religious tolerance and not specifically separation of church and state. In my opinion, religious tolerance predates the Enlightenment and might be an outcome partly of the natural law tradition but also a practical outcome of religious strife following the Reformation, especially since the religious wars were so deadly and the various sides were rather matched. (On the latter, I mean matched as in able to inflict much damage on each other -- unlike, say, in Albigensian Crusade where the Cathars were completely outmatched and unlikely to prove a serious military or existential threat to their suppressors.)

Also, you're adding in Deism now. Where did that come from? Why is it important to this discussion of Islam? To me, the rise of Deism is more the downfall of Christian in some ways. Likewise were Deism to rear its head in modern Islamic societies, I think Muslims would think of Deists there are non-Muslims and not as a new branch of Islam. (Of course, one can never be sure. Certainly, Christians have often thought even rival Christian sects were non-Christian -- though I know of no time when Christians have welcomed Deists as fellow Christians, whereas today it appears most mainstream Protestants sects recognize each other as Christian... Then again, this is under a regime of basic religious toleration and with a general loss of adherents to these sects. So, it might be the confluence of tolerance and loss of members driving them to stop denouncing each other -- the stakes of strife are too high and the reward too low.)

Edited April 13, 2010 by Dan Ust

[Leonid]

As I already pointed out before religious tolerance is moral issue; separation of religion and state is political problem. Deism created some room for man alongside God. Such a room doesn't exist in Islam which is religion of total submission.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Leonid,

I wish it were that simple and I even wish you spoke for Islam.

But it isn't that simple and you don't speak for Islam.

The ones who do have all kinds of different interpretations, just like any religion on earth.

It's a mistake to blank them out or pretend you know what they really think, despite their words and acts.

Michael

[Leonid]

Michael

1.Islam means submission to the will of Allah.

"ISLAM" As A Noun Surrender to Almighty Allah, 6 Articles of Belief, Submission to His Will

http://www.islamtomorrow.com/definition.asp

"In the language of the Holy Qur'an, Islam means the readiness of a person to take orders from God and to follow them. "

http://www.al-islam.org/inquiries/2.html

2.I don't need to speak for Islam, it pretty well speaks for itself-see my posts #65 #100

However, I never claimed that it that simple. See my post #119.

3.It's mistake to blank out the obvious.

4. You are welcome to bring up any interpretations which can prove that Islam doesn't mean submission.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Leonid,

I didn't claim "Islam doesn't mean submission" (to Allah) and you know it. More games.

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

You give off the general impression that you don't want people like Adonis to succeed in that mission, and it comes off as hatred as an end in itself.

That's the part I really reject.

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadis plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosives load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadi Martyrs plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosive load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[dan2100]

As I already pointed out before religious tolerance is moral issue; separation of religion and state is political problem. Deism created some room for man alongside God. Such a room doesn't exist in Islam which is religion of total submission.

I'm not sure where you're getting this from and many of your posts here seem like you don't want to be clear. At least, this is how it appears to me.

Religious tolerance, as used by others and me, usually is both a moral and political. The political side comes down to not coercing people because of their religious beliefs (or even lack of religious beliefs). Separation of Church and State is usually a means of achieving this because an official religion usually means laws outlawing variant religious practices and other means to support the state religion.

As for Deism, I'm not sure what you mean. Deism was, in a way, a child of the religious conflicts of the Reformation and after. I think much of the tolerance associated with it stems from growing up in that environment.

As for Islam, I think, again, you're retreating to scriptural determinism. If Islamic societies are, because they're Islamic, less tolerant, one has to look at history and ask why Islamic societies tolerated believers of other religions, specifically Jews and Christians. In fact, one the reasons Islam spread so rapidly in the Christian Middle East was that various persecuted Christian sects -- sects persecuted by ruling Christian sects -- were tolerated by Islamic invaders. Thus, members of these sects preferred the invaders to the former rulers.

Now, of course, you could argue that Muslims of that time were more religiously tolerant than, say, "Byzantine" Christians, but that this doesn't apply today. I agree that Western secular societies are more tolerant than Muslim societies. But this still doesn't explain, especially given your scriptural deterministic bent, why Muslim societies are ever tolerant at all. If their religion is one of total submission, as you tell us, then why do they allow Jews and Christians to exist at all within them? Doesn't this at least give you pause?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Bob,

I like to think in numbers sometimes. Your own numbers don't add up. The number of terrorist Islamists as opposed to the billion and a half plus of peaceful Muslims is way too tiny to make a vicious claim about all Muslims.

You would not say that just because some grains of sand are white, that all grains of sand are actually white underneath even when they are brown. The proof is that they are both sand.

Yet you do that with people. You don't like it when that's done to you, but you do it to others.

Two wrongs make a right in your world? They don't in mine. Outside of anything else, the numbers don't add up...

Michael

[dan2100]

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Bob,

I like to think in numbers sometimes. Your own numbers don't add up. The number of terrorist Islamists as opposed to the billion and a half plus of peaceful Muslims is way too tiny to make a vicious claim about all Muslims.

You would not say that just because some grains of sand are white, that all grains of sand are actually white underneath even when they are brown. The proof is that they are both sand.

Yet you do that with people. You don't like it when that's done to you, but you do it to others.

Two wrongs make a right in your world? They don't in mine. Outside of anything else, the numbers don't add up...

Michael

Michael,

There is nothing like fear -- in this case, fear of terrorism -- to make an otherwise sane person, should she or he succumb to it, adopt an irrational stance, don't you think?

Dan

[Martin Radwin]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadi Martyrs plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosive load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Why, Ba'al, why do you seem to be so upset at this prospect? After all, as you have repeatedly said, we are at war with the Muslim world. So, by implication, they are also at war with us. Also, as you have repeatedly said, there are no innocent victims in a war zone, so all killing in war zones is entirely justified. And since we are at war with the Muslim world, we are, by definition, a war zone. So if a couple of million Americans are killed in a terrorist attack, they are not innocent victims at all but are actually aiding the war effort. So the terrorists (excuse me, warriors, not terrorists) are entirely within their rights to kill the American civilians/combatants. Remember, there are no innocent victims in war. Don't they have just as much of a right to enjoy hearing the lamentations of our women as we have to enjoy hearing the lamentations of theirs?

Martin

[BaalChatzaf]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadi Martyrs plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosive load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Why, Ba'al, why do you seem to be so upset at this prospect? After all, as you have repeatedly said, we are at war with the Muslim world. So, by implication, they are also at war with us. Also, as you have repeatedly said, there are no innocent victims in a war zone, so all killing in war zones is entirely justified. And since we are at war with the Muslim world, we are, by definition, a war zone. So if a couple of million Americans are killed in a terrorist attack, they are not innocent victims at all but are actually aiding the war effort. So the terrorists (excuse me, warriors, not terrorists) are entirely within their rights to kill the American civilians/combatants. Remember, there are no innocent victims in war. Don't they have just as much of a right to enjoy hearing the lamentations of our women as we have to enjoy hearing the lamentations of theirs?

Martin

We have a war. I wonder what those who preach that Muslims are really o.k. guys propose as a way of fighting it.

If the U.S. goes balls out, we will win. We will also bleed. The Japanese gave the U.S three bad years but in the end we ground them into the mud. I have no doubt we could (and should) do the same to the Umah. We will have to do it the way we did it to the Japanese (who were also fanatical). Burn their cities to the ground and slaughter their women and children. It is as simple as that. If we cannot bring ourselves to do this, then the U.S. will be destroyed as a nation and our grandchildren and their descendants will live for a long time in The Shadow of the Mosque.

The fight is on. We shall surely bleed and many not only will die but are dying. Read the newspaper accounts of what is happening in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Eventually the public will be forced to take the war seriously and really fight it to win. Unless we do fight to win, we shall lose.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited April 20, 2010 by BaalChatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadi Martyrs plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosive load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Why, Ba'al, why do you seem to be so upset at this prospect? After all, as you have repeatedly said, we are at war with the Muslim world. So, by implication, they are also at war with us. Also, as you have repeatedly said, there are no innocent victims in a war zone, so all killing in war zones is entirely justified. And since we are at war with the Muslim world, we are, by definition, a war zone. So if a couple of million Americans are killed in a terrorist attack, they are not innocent victims at all but are actually aiding the war effort. So the terrorists (excuse me, warriors, not terrorists) are entirely within their rights to kill the American civilians/combatants. Remember, there are no innocent victims in war. Don't they have just as much of a right to enjoy hearing the lamentations of our women as we have to enjoy hearing the lamentations of theirs?

Martin

We have a war. I wonder what those who preach that Muslims are really o.k. guys propose as a way of fighting it.

If the U.S. goes balls out, we will win. We will also bleed. The Japanese gave the U.S three bad years but in the end we ground them into the mud. I have no doubt we could (and should) do the same to the Umah. We will have to do it the way we did it to the Japanese (who were also fanatical). Burn their cities to the ground and slaughter their women and children. It is as simple as that. If we cannot bring ourselves to do this, then the U.S. will be destroyed as a nation and our grandchildren and their descendants will live for a long time in The Shadow of the Mosque.

The fight is on. We shall surely bleed and many not only will die but are dying. Read the newspaper accounts of what is happening in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Eventually the public will be forced to take the war seriously and really fight it to win. Unless we do fight to win, we shall lose.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Kill the chickens too. If just one Muslim chicken survives our great-grandchildren will live in chickencoops.

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

Kill the chickens too. If just one Muslim chicken survives our great-grandchildren will live in chickencoops.

--Brant

What have you learned from the Pacific war? What have you learned from our own Civil War? In order to defeat the Japanese we had to fight a very Hard War. We did not spare women and children. In the end we had to kill their god, by terming the Emperor into a flesh a blood human. To defeat the Islamic fanatics we will have to kill their god. How shall we do that? By making them more afraid of us than of Allah.

In order to put an end to Southern treason and insurrection the Union Troops had to drive Old Dixie into the ground. The Union people had to destroy Georgia and South Carolina. They had to ravage the Shenendoah Valley so badly that a crop could not be raised there for five years. We had to kill the notion of the sovereignty of the States and end their political ambitions once and for all. When we got through Secession and Slavery were dead and gone.

We are in the fight of our lives. Don't you think we ought to take it seriously. Your remark seems to indicate not. Am I wrong? How do you propose that we fight these Islamic kami-kazes? These wanabe Servants of God, these Martyrs? Just what do you propose? Shall we pretend we are up against rational people? I do not think so.

I am truly at my wits end here. Normal negotiations simply will not work with these people. So what will? I visited that hold in the ground where the WTC once stood and I felt despair because I know in my bones it is going to happen to us again. What shall we do? We are up against people whose holy duty is to destroy us. How shall we prevent it? I have proposed a very bad solution ; kill them and God damn the collateral damage. What do you propose that is better? And why do you think it will work?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited April 20, 2010 by BaalChatzaf

[dan2100]

I reject your insinuation (and it is constant in your posts) that it is impossible for Muslims to adopt separation of church and state. The people who truly speak for Islam, such as Adonis--who is a practicing Muslim, are finding ways to make it work, just like Christians have done--without, I might add, 100% agreement between all denominations.

"truly" speak? Are you familiar with taq'iyya? That is Arabic for deception which the q'ran permits to a believer to advance the cause of Islam.

But give Adonis the benefit of the doubt. Will the wonderfulness he is proposing take place before or after a squad of Jihadi Martyrs plants a dirty radioactive bomb in either Washington or New York? Or before an 18 wheeler, driven by a Martyr, carries explosive load and sets it off in a tunnel or on a bridge during rush hour?

What do you think? Are you sure? I am not. And if the worst happens what do you propose we should do?

Ba'al Chatzaf

Why, Ba'al, why do you seem to be so upset at this prospect? After all, as you have repeatedly said, we are at war with the Muslim world. So, by implication, they are also at war with us. Also, as you have repeatedly said, there are no innocent victims in a war zone, so all killing in war zones is entirely justified. And since we are at war with the Muslim world, we are, by definition, a war zone. So if a couple of million Americans are killed in a terrorist attack, they are not innocent victims at all but are actually aiding the war effort. So the terrorists (excuse me, warriors, not terrorists) are entirely within their rights to kill the American civilians/combatants. Remember, there are no innocent victims in war. Don't they have just as much of a right to enjoy hearing the lamentations of our women as we have to enjoy hearing the lamentations of theirs?

Martin

We have a war. I wonder what those who preach that Muslims are really o.k. guys propose as a way of fighting it.

If the U.S. goes balls out, we will win. We will also bleed. The Japanese gave the U.S three bad years but in the end we ground them into the mud. I have no doubt we could (and should) do the same to the Umah. We will have to do it the way we did it to the Japanese (who were also fanatical). Burn their cities to the ground and slaughter their women and children. It is as simple as that. If we cannot bring ourselves to do this, then the U.S. will be destroyed as a nation and our grandchildren and their descendants will live for a long time in The Shadow of the Mosque.

The fight is on. We shall surely bleed and many not only will die but are dying. Read the newspaper accounts of what is happening in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Eventually the public will be forced to take the war seriously and really fight it to win. Unless we do fight to win, we shall lose.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Kill the chickens too. If just one Muslim chicken survives our great-grandchildren will live in chickencoops.

--Brant

Ba'al's continued advocacy of total war reminds me of Sumner's "The Conquest of the U. S. by Spain." It's online at:

http://praxeology.net/WGS-CUS.htm

[Brant Gaede]

Kill the chickens too. If just one Muslim chicken survives our great-grandchildren will live in chickencoops.

--Brant

What have you learned from the Pacific war? What have you learned from our own Civil War? In order to defeat the Japanese we had to fight a very Hard War. We did not spare women and children. In the end we had to kill their god, by terming the Emperor into a flesh a blood human. To defeat the Islamic fanatics we will have to kill their god. How shall we do that? By making them more afraid of us than of Allah.

In order to put an end to Southern treason and insurrection the Union Troops had to drive Old Dixie into the ground. The Union people had to destroy Georgia and South Carolina. They had to ravage the Shenendoah Valley so badly that a crop could not be raised there for five years. We had to kill the notion of the sovereignty of the States and end their political ambitions once and for all. When we got through Secession and Slavery were dead and gone.

We are in the fight of our lives. Don't you think we ought to take it seriously. Your remark seems to indicate not. Am I wrong? How do you propose that we fight these Islamic kami-kazes? These wanabe Servants of God, these Martyrs? Just what do you propose? Shall we pretend we are up against rational people? I do not think so.

I am truly at my wits end here. Normal negotiations simply will not work with these people. So what will? I visited that hold in the ground where the WTC once stood and I felt despair because I know in my bones it is going to happen to us again. What shall we do? We are up against people whose holy duty is to destroy us. How shall we prevent it? I have proposed a very bad solution ; kill them and God damn the collateral damage. What do you propose that is better? And why do you think it will work?

Ba'al Chatzaf

I grew up under the threat of general thermonuclear war. One way or the other that threat was dealt with without killing 100-200 million Soviets.

You do not understand that war is failure of other means, stupidity and happenstance and the big idea is not to fight the big one by fighting smaller ones, if you have to, and best of all not at all. You also do not understand there are other means of fighting than bombs and bullets. You understand bombs and bullets somewhat and almost nothing else about the multi-faceted complexities of conflict. One conflict morphs into another and on and on and it will go on and on interminably for the world is too big and diverse for all its peoples to be in one tribe.

--Brant

stand strong and tall

[dan2100]

I grew up under the threat of general thermonuclear war. One way or the other that threat was dealt with without killing 100-200 million Soviets.

You do not understand that war is failure of other means, stupidity and happenstance and the big idea is not to fight the big one by fighting smaller ones, if you have to, and best of all not at all. You also do not understand there are other means of fighting than bombs and bullets. You understand bombs and bullets somewhat and almost nothing else about the multi-faceted complexities of conflict. One conflict morphs into another and on and on and it will go on and on interminably for the world is too big and diverse for all its peoples to be in one tribe.

--Brant

stand strong and tall

Brant, this is all the more reason to head out to the frontier. When people can't peacefully get along, I think having space between them works best.

[Leonid]

Michael" You give off the general impression that you don't want people like Adonis to succeed in that mission, and it comes off as hatred as an end in itself."

I'm not responsible for your impressions. They have no connection to my posts. If you and Adonis decided to invent a new religion, at least have a decency not to call it "Islam". The copyrights for this name is reserved to Mohammed who created religion based on brute force, hatred and racism.