Islamophobia? Hardly!

I daresay the above picture says it all.

For years, people have had a knee-jerk reaction everytime a Mohammedan (Islamic, Muslim) person or group commits an act of war against non-Mohammedans. The reaction is, "Oh! These people are twisting Islam into something it isn't to justify their actions!" This is because we, as Americans who have been told that "Islam is a great religion," want to believe that all "religions" are the same. In fact, the Ecumenical movement folks declare that "there are may paths to God, and Islam is one of them."

Well, I don't know about you, but in my observations of the last 25 years or so, and in my study of History (with a more recent focus on the history of Mohammedanism (Islam) vis-a-vis the rest of the world) over the years, both in and out of schools, I've noticed something. That tale of  "all religions are the same and lead to God" ain't so. There are differences in religions. MAJOR differences, if we're honest.

I don't claim to be an expert on Theology and the like; however, I AM literate, have some degree of intelligence, and can actually THINK for myself. The very NAME of this blog should tell you THAT, whether you agree with what's written here or not. Using the intelligence God gave me, and the literacy skills I learned from grade school on up, I can see that, of all the "religions" that exist or have existed, only ONE tells its adherents to "slay the infidel wherever you find him," or "we are to fight you until you worship Allah alone *oops, I wasn't supposed to reveal the "religion". Oh, right. I've already done that.*. Let's go down the list, shall we?

Um, any of this in the Vedas of Hinduism? Nope, not there.

How about Buddhism? Did Siddhartha Gautama, also known as the Buddha, say anything like this? Um, can't find it in any Buddhist text that may be extant.

What about Animism and Shamanism, as currently or formerly practiced among the indigenous peoples of North America or in parts of sub-Saharan Africa? Considering most of those don't even have texts, probably NOT.

Let's take a look at Judaism? *looks in the "Old Testament of the Bible* Oh, wait, there is something here about removing the Canaanites from the land promised to Avram, Yitzhak, Yachov, and their progeny. I suppose that could be used to justify warfare and violence. Oh, wait. That was for a specific time, in a specific area, and a specific group of people whose practices included human sacrifice (including throwing babies into roaring fires). Oh, yeah, and the time for those actions was limited to a couple generations and then only for a specified amount of land. After that, they could defend the land. They even expanded under their second king, David. However, I don't think that the Israelites, at that point, did any removal of peoples. They put them under their suzerainty, yes. Oh, yeah. They had some laws. Apparently, ONE set of laws that EVERYONE had to follow. Still, I don't see anything about "slaying infidels" or forcing everyone to believe as they do. Guess we can rule out Judaism.

Let's take a look at Christianity, shall we? O.K., what two main themes does Yeshua (Jesus, Iesus, Iesuos, Gesu, Ya'sua) speak on? *looks in the "New Testament" of the Bible* Oh, well, look here! "You are to love the Lord, Yahweh, with all your heart, all your mind, and all your strength," and "Love your neighbor as yourself." Hmm, that sounds awfully nice. Seems entirely different from "slay the infidel" and "fight until none but Allah is worshipped." *looks further* Hmm... it seems that Yeshua isn't ENTIRELY sweetness and light. Apparently, that last book shows Him having had enough, running out of patience, and wreaking havok on the unbelievers and what not. Oh, wait. Apparently, He's still giving people a chance to choose Him, even in the midst of all this. It seems someone else is killing those who do choose Him. Ah... so THAT'S why He descends and unleashes hell on his enemies.  Hm... still, I don't see any call for people to kill other people on His behalf. Oh, and it seems He's coming to rescue... What? According to this, He's coming to rescue Jews, along with others who are still around and believe in Him.  Not seeing any calls, even in that last book of the Bible, for people to go around killing others because they refuse to believe.

Well, I think I've hit all the major "religions." Oh, you say I forgot about Islam.

No, I didn't forget. I just wanted to address an argument some bring up about the "Crusades" and the "Christians" being somehow involved in those. Can't leave that be. Gotta address that.

If my readings and my recollections are correct, the Christian faith had spread itself over three or four centuries over the entirety of that little empire that was around back then called the Roman Empire. I seem to remember that they didn't do it by fighting and killing non-Christians. In fact, it seems the Roman government went about killing THEM from time to time. Still, by the beginning of the 5th Century, Christianity was pretty much found everywhere in what were, or had been Roman lands. Even beyond, apparently. So, why did these Christians have these "Crusades," anyway?

Oh, right. Sometime, starting from the early 7th Century, some Arabian con-man named Mohammed took some of his native paganism, twisted some stories from the Bible, and borrowed some from the Talmud (which, by the way, is not Scripture, but more akin to the Apocrypha in Christian literature). He called this concoction "Islam." Apparently, however, his fellow Arabians didn't buy it when the tried to preach it. So, he went off to another town and began attacking caravans from his hometown to fun his new "religion." He eventually bludgeoned, robbed, murdered, raped, and pillaged his way to rule over Arabia, and then decided that the rest of the world needed his "religion."

Of course, he knew it was too incoherent, too nonsensical, too mean-spirited, and too, well, just plain evil, for anyone to choose to follow it. So, he decided to lead raids and wars to force people to follow this. His successors fought, pillaged, raped, slaughtered their way into taking over Persia, Mesopotamia, Iudaea, much of Anatolia, Egypt, Libya, Cyrenaica, Carthage, parts of Numidia, Berber lands and up into Hispania and Lusitania. All this by conquest, NOT by conversion through the word. Well, I can see why the Christians (by this time, mostly Roman Catholics in the West, and Orthodox in the East of the old Roman Empire) might be a bit upset.  After all, you can only take so much of someone beating on you before you have to strike back. 

Well, apparently, they decided early to push these invaders, who called themselves "Muslims" back from the southern part of what is now France and try to drive them off the Iberian Peninsula. Took 'em 700 years, but they did finally succeed. While this is going on, them "Muslims" are pressing their attacks further into Anatolia and east into India and Central Asia. Finally, some folks stopped their advance into China and India, and I've already mentioned Iberia. Unfortunately, them Eastern Romans were having a harder time. It got so bad, that they called on their cousins in the West to help them out. So, that means that the "Crusades" were a belated attempt to stop the Muslims from pressing on to try and conquer the rest of the world.

O.K. Enough of that. Let's take a look.. hm... what's that? *turns to the side to hear someone in the audience* You say I don't need to continue this? You've figured out what "religion" tells people to "slay the infidel," and "fight until only Allah is worshipped," you say? Well, very good.

O.K. Now that we've seen that it is Islam that does that, what about CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations) and their contention about this thing called "Islamophobia?" Well, in a nutshell, a "phobia" is an irrational fear of something. Considering the 1400 year history of Islam and the fact that nearly all the world's terrorists are followers of Islam, I think it's safe to say that a "fear" of Islam is NOT irrational.

Here endeth the lesson.