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I am religious and believe in free will

70 (27.6%)

I am religious and do not believe in free will

10 (3.9%)

I am not religious and believe in free will

113 (44.5%)

I am not religious and do not believe in free will

61 (24%)

Total Members Voted: 249

[Arx]

As far as I know, a ceasefire was signed in mid-2014.

Regarding the LRA, I suppose you could say they're equivalent, but I think the disconnect between their actions/interpretations and the Bible/mainstream interpretation is much, much larger than that between those of Islamic extremists and the Qu'ran/mainstream interpretation.

[Rolan7]

Yeah, at the risk of invoking "No True Scotsman", those guys seem about as Christian as Hitler.  IE, technically Christian, and using certain parts of the Bible to commit horrendous crimes, but you can't really say they're following Jesus.  The Old Testament, yes, but not Jesus.

The scale is absolutely different too.  Even if these were monks instead of basically a militant cult of personality, it wouldn't begin to stack up against Islamic extremeism.  This is basically like bringing up abortion bombings and saying "See, crazy Christians do bombings too!"  Technically true, but orders of magnitude different.

As an aside, one reason I haven't read the Quran much is because it can supposedly only be appreciated in Arabic.  So they shut down useful debate *even faster* than Christian apologists do.

[scrdest]

Yeah, at the risk of invoking "No True Scotsman", those guys seem about as Christian as Hitler.  IE, technically Christian, and using certain parts of the Bible to commit horrendous crimes, but you can't really say they're following Jesus.  The Old Testament, yes, but not Jesus.

The scale is absolutely different too.  Even if these were monks instead of basically a militant cult of personality, it wouldn't begin to stack up against Islamic extremeism.  This is basically like bringing up abortion bombings and saying "See, crazy Christians do bombings too!"  Technically true, but orders of magnitude different.

As an aside, one reason I haven't read the Quran much is because it can supposedly only be appreciated in Arabic.  So they shut down useful debate *even faster* than Christian apologists do.

They don't follow your interpretation of Jesus any more than ISIS doesn't follow a liberal Muslim's interpretation of Muhammad/Allah. Since the Big Guy is not up for hanging out with humanity and telling us which dicks just don't get him, maaaaan, it's all the same.

And Quran being only appreciated in Arabic is possibly the same brand of logic as the KJV 4EVA folks, perhaps a bit more justified considering it wasn't written in a jillion different languages in the first place.

[Frumple]

Regarding the LRA, I suppose you could say they're equivalent, but I think the disconnect between their actions/interpretations and the Bible/mainstream interpretation is much, much larger than that between those of Islamic extremists and the Qu'ran/mainstream interpretation.

They're really kinda' not. Qu'ran has even less wriggle room for the kind of stuff islamic extremists get up to than the christian bible does for its ilk -- islam's actually fairly explicit in regards to what is appropriate re: civilian treatment, wars of aggression, and so on, and the actions of islamic extremists in the present and past shit all over that. And we've had the discussion re: violence and the bible more than once -- it's both pretty permissive and considerably vague.

Mainstream interpretations are perhaps a different story, but there's a hell of a lot more going on there than the religions themselves.

[Graknorke]

Qu'ran has even less wriggle room for the kind of stuff islamic extremists get up to

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

And be not slack so as to cry for peace and you have the upper hand, and Allah is with you, and He will not bring your deeds to naught.

Right you are, there isn't much wiggle room there.

[Arx]

The Qu'ran has passages that advocate retaliatory justice and violence under certain very specific circumstances (I've read them, in context - one of the ones I'm thinking of occurs late in Al-Baqara). There are no passages advocating violence under any circmstance in the teachings of Jesus. I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

And we've had the discussion re: violence and the bible more than once -- it's both pretty permissive and considerably vague.

As I recall, no one was ever able to show me exactly where the New Testament is permissive of violence. Nor where it was vague.

[Harry Baldman]

You know, the free will thing makes me think about the whole "God is a scientist" schtick that pops up here and there (well, mostly in sci-fi as far as I've seen).

See, if God is a scientist, that'd presumably make us a model that it created to study something. We exist to live and die at its behest, providing answers to questions we can never hope to understand any more than an eyeless fruit fly can know why it cannot see and that its existence indeed has a definite purpose. Amusingly, humanity is even an inbred strain of sorts with its genetic bottlenecks, which is an interesting similarity to your average model organism.

So, if this is true, the why of our existence is because God wills us to provide it with information, and the manifestation of free will is essentially how we differ from the control group (or if we are the control group, what is the baseline we are establishing). And if it ever seems that God is acting in a malicious fashion toward the people of the world, it might be because it definitely is doing so. All for a good cause, presumably, or not, since God is presently unknowable and unprovable with the tools we possess, and what goes through its mind would be impossible to predict.

Not really a serious line of thought (and also highly anthropocentric), but still a thing I found fun to think about.

[Frumple]

I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

I didn't.

Also, at this point, I'm... tired of trying, at the moment. I'm not muslim, and if you and others want to demonize the religion and by extension its believers, just. Go for it. I've more or less given up. Spread your hate, willfully interpret the text as anti-christians interpret the bible, do whatever.

[Rolan7]

You know, the free will thing makes me think about the whole "God is a scientist" schtick that pops up here and there (well, mostly in sci-fi as far as I've seen).

See, if God is a scientist, that'd presumably make us a model that it created to study something. We exist to live and die at its behest, providing answers to questions we can never hope to understand any more than an eyeless fruit fly can know why it cannot see and that its existence indeed has a definite purpose. Amusingly, humanity is even an inbred strain of sorts with its genetic bottlenecks, which is an interesting similarity to your average model organism.

So, if this is true, the why of our existence is because God wills us to provide it with information, and the manifestation of free will is essentially how we differ from the control group (or if we are the control group, what is the baseline we are establishing). And if it ever seems that God is acting in a malicious fashion toward the people of the world, it might be because it definitely is doing so. All for a good cause, presumably, or not, since God is presently unknowable and unprovable with the tools we possess, and what goes through its mind would be impossible to predict.

Not really a serious line of thought (and also highly anthropocentric), but still a thing I found fun to think about.

It does explain all the arbitrary and changing rules.  I wonder if God has a control group   ...Or huh, I guess that could be us!
Also makes you wonder if there's an experiment out there even worse off...

The Qu'ran has passages that advocate retaliatory justice and violence under certain very specific circumstances (I've read them, in context - one of the ones I'm thinking of occurs late in Al-Baqara). There are no passages advocating violence under any circmstance in the teachings of Jesus. I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

And we've had the discussion re: violence and the bible more than once -- it's both pretty permissive and considerably vague.

As I recall, no one was ever able to show me exactly where the New Testament is permissive of violence. Nor where it was vague.

The closest thing I remember is that Jesus says he's not replacing the old (violent) laws.  But he also kinda says he *is* replacing them.  Beyond that, I don't think he ever teaches that people should kill others.  He warns that *God* will kill, and eternally punish/burn, but I don't see him suggesting that we help with that.

I basically only skimmed an annotated Matthew though so IDK.

I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

I didn't.

Also, at this point, I'm... tired of trying, at the moment. I'm not muslim, and if you and others want to demonize the religion and by extension its believers, just. Go for it. I've more or less given up. Spread your hate, willfully interpret the text as anti-christians interpret the bible, do whatever.

Those earlier quotes are pretty damning.  We aren't "demonizing" it, it's plainly violent.  Though maybe an apologist can explain why it isn't.

[Arx]

I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

I didn't.

Also, at this point, I'm... tired of trying, at the moment. I'm not muslim, and if you and others want to demonize the religion and by extension its believers, just. Go for it. I've more or less given up. Spread your hate, willfully interpret the text as anti-christians interpret the bible, do whatever.

I'm not actually trying to demonise it. I don't oppose it. I'm okay with Muslims. I'd be okay with Islam massively expanding. It just pisses me off when people try to associate Christianity with terrorists. No doubt you feel the same way about Islam.

Also, now you know how I feel every time I check this thread. Every damned time. Except that quote mining Christianity is socially acceptable, and quoting the Qu'ran in context with the concession that the quoted passages are not applicable to very is demonisation. No, I'm not bitter, why do you ask?

Edit: I only just noticed the "...by extension its believers" thing, after Bohandas posted. The irony is so thick right now.

[Bohandas]

I don't see how, given that, you can say that Christianity is more a religion of violence.

I didn't.

Also, at this point, I'm... tired of trying, at the moment. I'm not muslim, and if you and others want to demonize the religion and by extension its believers, just. Go for it. I've more or less given up. Spread your hate, willfully interpret the text as anti-christians interpret the bible, do whatever.

And here we see another loaded false connection. Plenty of people (I'd go as far as to say the majority of people) identify as members of particular religions without following all that religion's tenets or believing all it's dogma. Furthermore, plenty of religious denominations preaxh a dogma that is out of line with the holy books that supposedly form the basis of their faiths.

[Frumple]

I'm not actually trying to demonise it. I don't oppose it. I'm okay with Muslims. I'd be okay with Islam massively expanding. It just pisses me off when people try to associate Christianity with terrorists. No doubt you feel the same way about Islam.

Also, now you know how I feel every time I check this thread. Every damned time. Except that quote mining Christianity is socially acceptable, and quoting the Qu'ran in context with the concession that the quoted passages are not applicable to very is demonisation. No, I'm not bitter, why do you ask?

Don't really give a damn about the quote mining. The difference I've spent too much time -- especially offline --running into between most of the biblical ones and most of the qu'ran ones is that the former is maybe trying to deconvert or belittle, and the latter is being used to support rhetoric that calls for the absolute genocide of the world's muslim population. Spend way to much of my goddamn time around people (devout christians, of course ) calling for glassing the middle east or murdering the world's muslim population down to the child, supported and emboldened by rhetoric hinged on stuff like that, to keep associating with the foundations of that message in my off time, too, y'know? Don't really have the energy at the moment, especially not when it's probably about to engender another wave of atrocities.

For what it's worth, it's fairly frustrating for me when people associate christianity with terrorism, too (you'll note, again, that I wasn't actually doing that). There's damned few religions out there for which the actions terroism involves aren't explicitly damning.

[Arx]

If you don't think I'm demonising Islam, don't fucking accuse me of demonising fucking Islam. If you do think I'm demonising Islam, then... I'm going to assume you're having a bad day or something.

[Frumple]

... sure, okay, you're not demonising it. Just calling it a religion of violence (I guess if you want to be technical, just "more of" one than christianity) and saying it finds the actions of terrorists more acceptable than christianity does. If that wasn't your intent, then yeah, bad day, apologies for the misinterpretation.

[Arx]

I at no point called it a religion of violence, either. You're roughly correct in saying that I think it's more violent than Christianity (which does not imply that I think it's violent, because I struggle to see how any Christian can justify violence at all). I didn't say it finds the actions of terrorists more acceptable than Christianity does, either. I said the disconnect is bigger - that is, that it's a smaller step to terrorism from Islam than from Christianity. Doesn't mean it's not a frickin' massive step, and that the 'normal' (I know that's not rght, but I can't do better right now) believers don't feel the same way in both religions.

I did overreact, though, so sorry about that. The step isn't as much bigger as I said, I was just kinda offended and flailing.

E: so in summary, this is a touchy topic for both of us. Sorry I blew up a bit there.