"Surely God is high, supreme"

Your's isn't too bad either - great photo.

Hooray, when do we start the stoning? We christians already have the purity laws in the old testament. The muslims took six hundred years more to figure it out.
regards

I'm not sure what you're getting at. You wouldn't try to understand Christianity or Judaism solely by reading Leviticus (I hope).

Glen, I could do post after post about the failings of Christianity, and I've made mention of it elsewhere. But that's not my point (at least in this post).

Josh, I'm not arguing that we should try to understand Islamism through the one passage I quoted from the Koran. At all. I'm not sure I said anything even remotely close to that (though I'd be curious at to why you thought I did).

To offer my summary take on the whole thing (which I wasn't really intending to get into), I fully acknowledge the complexity of the Islamism vs. The West, its history, and the potential for moral hypocrisy. But all those things, in my mind, do not make Islamism (which is different than the religion of "Islam" proper) any less morally horrific and anti-human.

In a narrow sense, if we aren't willing to state that suicide bombing is morally repulsive and deeply revolting, what moral leg do we have left to stand on?

I'm not trying to be myopic here, or to argue that the entire situation needs to be read through that one issue (heck, Islamist atrocities abound re: their treatment of women), but I feel we're going to end up ultimately unjust, unequal, and immoral if, at a certain point, we can't simply call something evil.

So does this mean I cannot invite my ex over? I had a whole bag of well shaped rocks and everything.
Ok, so atrocities abound. No one will disagree with that. But to frame them as Islamic or christian or hindu(talk about atrocities in the name of..!) is itself unjust. Extremist cannot define a religion, else all of us are worse for it.
regards

That's true GlenH (for the most part) which is why if you read what I wrote closely you'll see I reference "Islamism" and even state overtly that it is different than Islam (in the comment anyway).

Also, if you take the time to read the Amis essay, you'll see he says the same (and takes the time to flush out the distinction).

I wasn't trying to take you to task. It just seemed like a strange passage to quote.

I don't know what makes people do evil things. I don't feel hostile toward any ethnic or religious group, only toward ignorance. We are, in the west, very ignorant of Islam, very ignorant as to just how many similarities we share with Islam (Father Abraham had many sons..), and very ignorant of our foreign policy in general. And it is a specific form of ignorance that makes people think that these acts of terrorism and war are noble or dignified in any way, or that any god would want it.

I suspect what we regard as evil in this case is really a very deep and bitter feeling of hopelessness. I just wish I knew how to take the first step toward a more hopeful world.

I think every human being desires justice. I just think we have come to far as human beings to regard murder and violence as acceptable forms of justice. I know I sound like a "peacenik" or something. Acts like 9/11 are brutal and horrific, and the only common bond that unites people that perpetrate such acts is that they regard murder and violence as an option. We have the power to stop those who wish to kill us without killing them. We should demand that be the standard.

I'm not upset with you Josiah because, even though I don't know you very well, and even though you support Bob Corker, I know that you care about people and care about fairness...and care about being informed, which is why you were examining a section of the Qur'an to begin with I imagine.

Though neither of your correspondents seem to have troubled to read the article, Josiah, just thought I'd note for GlenH's benefit that if he wishes to equate Christianity and Islam, he'll need to do more than cite purity laws. It's true that the Old Testament legal code frequently prescribes draconian penalties for innocuous behaviors. But the institutionalized misogyny of Islam - which MA believes is at the root of the current gangrenous state of that faith - is nowhere evident in the OT. I hate to put a crimp in GlenH's milquetoast attempts at creating equivalencies between the two belief systems, but he's going to have a damned hard time finding in the OT any license to beat women as a routine disciplinary measure.

O, and had they bothered to read the article, they'd have found this quote in re: Islam and Islamism:

"Until recently it was being said that what we are confronted with, here, is 'a civil war' within Islam. That's what all this was supposed to be: not a clash of civilisations or anything like that, but a civil war within Islam. Well, the civil war appears to be over. And Islamism won it. The loser, moderate Islam, is always deceptively well-represented on the level of the op-ed page and the public debate; elsewhere, it is supine and inaudible. We are not hearing from moderate Islam. Whereas Islamism, as a mover and shaper of world events, is pretty well all there is.

So, to repeat, we respect Islam - the donor of countless benefits to mankind, and the possessor of a thrilling history. But Islamism? No, we can hardly be asked to respect a creedal wave that calls for our own elimination. More, we regard the Great Leap Backwards as a tragic development in Islam's story, and now in ours. Naturally we respect Islam. But we do not respect Islamism, just as we respect Muhammad and do not respect Muhammad Atta."

MA clearly places responsibility for the current conflict between the West and Islamic terrorists on "Islamism." Which I'm beginning to suspect is a mistaken charity: there must be something poisonous in a faith which can so easily become corrupted into a thoroughgoing cult of death.

On the contrary I did read the essay. I dissagree with the authors conclusion. Maybe it is worth pointing out, prior to Augustine's time(400ceapprox.) christians were martyr'd for not serving in the military. I would equate much of "modern christianity" with present day islamisms. It may dab some ointment on Amis' racism and maybe julian's unfounded fear, that does not make it truth. The foreign policy of the U.S. is stained with more than enough blood. McViegh and Rudolph comes to mind as an example. Just as an aside what arab (or any asia minor) news do you(catholic sense) subscribe to? It is easy and comfortable to accept the mushroom growing medium we get fed here. My quess is most "christians" are like the author, we hear the crickets chirping.

Glen, it's the part that's left over after you remove the "much" i.e. the suicide bombing etc. that's so damningly different. Sure, there are analogous things, but, you know, last time I checked the dominant voice from the "Christian Right" (of which I'm not a part) wasn't "let's send little Johnny off to blow up the local cafe."

But other than that, what are you talking about? How was McViegh and Rudolph exercising American foreign policy? I'm inclined to think you're not making any sense, but it may be me.

Josiah: you're right. He isn't making any sense. What the devil is "hear the crickets chirping" supposed to mean, anyway?

Just for the record, glen, I regularly read the Jerusalem Post, which provides some of the best coverage of regional events. Oh wait, that's right, because it's Israeli, it shouldn't count. Now who's the racist?

I've blogged at length on the essay, and if glen didn't like you're reaction, he's going to just love mine.

Josiah,
sorry I get to typing and forget to proof read. Examples of extreme " modern christians", McViegh and Rudolph were before the foriegn policy issue. Gotta' keep my thumb off the touch pad. Johnny doesn't need to strap his bombs on, he gets million dollar weapons to use. Just because we drive the weapons to the battlefield instead of strapping it on some how makes our killing(defending Kinder, Küche, Kirche) more noble? My point however circuitous is, there is no moral highground, not for christians or muslims. Lending the religious framework to killing is an injustice to all of us.

Ryan, you have me blocked in your discussions. I ahve wanted to discuss your posts many time. Crickets chirping sybolically represents silence. I read the post, among others.

Glen, absolutely. Now if the purpose of the "tank driving onto the battlefield" were to kill himself and civilians then it would be no different.

But we're not talking about that. There exists a possible justification for the war in Iraq (whether or not I think it exists aside). There is no justification for suicide bombing.

Yes, the issue is complicated. Yes, there is plenty of evil to be laid at the feet of both sides.

But my point, and the point of my post isn't that America is perfect (it's not) but it is that there's something evil, deeply evil, about the Culture of Death present in Islamism.

It's ok for you to say you think it's f'd up. You're not going to lose levelheadedness credibility for saying so (you may in fact, IMO, gain some moral sensibility).

glenH: Didn't realized I had blacklisted you. I had actually forgotten that I'd blacklisted anyone. So I looked at my 3-item blacklist and saw that the only additions to that list were on July 8 and August 7 of 2005. So I looked back through the comments and tried to figure out who it was.

If you are the same as the "Glen" who made these comments I don't think the dialogue on my site has suffered for your absence.

Ryan,
I am the same "Glen" that wrote those comments. Seems history has proven me correct, the story in the Republic about AA was a plant and discredited. I miss listening to Air America in Chattanooga!
J.Goebels was not the originator of propaganda, just the one of the most noteworthy porponents. Be Well.