“Islam is a peaceful and tolerant religion.” —Tony Blair
“Islam is a religion of peace.” —George W. Bush
“Those who know nothing of Islam pretend that Islam counsels against war. Islam says: Kill all the unbelievers just as they would kill you all! ...Kill them, put them to the sword and scatter [their armies]… Islam says: Whatever good there is exists thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword!” —Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
If you don't know which one is right, you haven’t been reading your Koran.
We might as well start off right here with the usual chin music about how “most Muslims are peaceful and blah, blah blah…” It’s a fact. Most Muslims didn’t pick the religion; they were born into it. To them, it seems to have its good points; and it sure helps keep the kids in line. Still…
Most Muslims don’t strap bombs to themselves or fly airplanes into buildings; but at least a reported 28% admit that they think activities like that are justified “in some cases.” That’s also a fact, whether we like it or not (we don’t).
It’s a topic of discussion that has the demonstrated capacity to drive its enthusiasts to homicide. Somali-born Ayaan Hirsi Ali collaborated in Denmark with Theo Van Gogh (a distant descendant of the painter) to make a seemingly harmless little film about some of the travails of women under Islam; Van Gogh was murdered in the street for his trouble. Hirsi Ali has been under round the clock protection ever since: the killer left her a threatening letter spiked into his victim’s chest. According to that young enthusiast and a lot of others of his ilk, the like-minded devotee who kills Hirsi Ali gets a one-way, first-class ticket to paradise.
Speaking of Denmark, a few cartoons get published and there are riots in the streets. More than a hundred people die in the aftermath.
Speaking of riots, thousands run amok in Paris night after night, setting cars and buildings on fire. The authorities blame the “unrest” on “disaffected youth” and possibly “marginalization” and maybe even “racism.” But nobody’s fooled by the doubletalk, including the ones doing the doubletalking. They’re just trying to manage the havoc.
Speaking of havoc… the Pope quotes a leader of the long-gone Byzantine Empire and his observation that Islam has been spread by the sword (see the Ayatollah, above). More riots ensue, more people die. More “disaffected youth” march in the streets and clamor in London parks waving signs that say, “BEHEAD THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM,” and “SLAUGHTER THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM” and “BUTCHER THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM.” The message: “Kill anyone who says ours is a violent religion.”
The problem is that Islam HAS been spread by the sword - or the threat of the sword. The great armies of Islam weren’t overrunning southern Europe to ring doorbells and sell cookies. There was mass killing, and lots of children and women sold into slavery, and copious booty carried away. There was plunder, wreck and ruin.
But that was then; what does that have to do with now? Why bring all that unpleasantness up? Besides, “the Crusades were violent, too, and blah, blah, blah..." That’s also a fact.
Setting aside all the historical arguments against that comparison, the comparison still doesn't wash; we are left with a single, unimpeachable fact: one group's violence doesn't mitigate another's. And here is a comparison we should make, and should keep in mind: the Crusades ended centuries ago; the Islamists are killing people now. Perhaps we should march in the streets to protest the launching of the eighth Crusade. Weren't the first seven enough? Let's make a note to get a consensus going on that, just as soon as we deal with what is happening in the world today.
The issue looms large, and promises to loom larger. The most popular name for newborns in England today is Mohammad. There are Muslim neighborhoods that are off limits to the police - in France. But that’s Europe’s problem, n’est-ce pas? No, it’s ours, too. Because there are plenty of imams (Islamic clerics) right over here on our side of the pond who dream out loud about the day when “the banner of Islam will fly over the White House.” How will that be accomplished? I refer you again to the words of the Ayatollah.
And they don’t just dream it; they mean it to happen. The religion tells them that the world is divided into “dar al-Islam” and “dar al-harb”: the House of Islam and the House of War. The House of Islam is wherever Islam rules over every aspect of life, including government, law, and every conceivable thought, word and deed.
The House of War is everywhere else. The Ayatollah wasn’t the only one who recognized that his religion says it is required of every Muslim to make war on everyone, everywhere - until Islam rules the earth. When they talk about the inhabitants of the House of War, they mean us. That’s what the religion keeps reminding the imams, and that’s what they keep reminding the masses.
There is timelessness to the religion of Islam that most Westerners have trouble understanding. Mohammad lived in a violent world - but then again, he was committing a lot of the violence. And Islam says that he was the ideal man, the absolute best ever, and the example every Muslim should emulate, forever. Not just sort of emulate except for the icky parts; not an example that needs to be reformulated for modern times, like substituting the word “pester” for every instance of the word “kill”; but an absolute and timeless way for every true Muslim to behave.
To our modern sensibilities, lively activities like beheading enemies, stoning women to death, and cutting off people’s hands and feet seem a tad harsh. But Islam says that Mohammad did all these things, and ordered all these things to be done - and that no one should presume to improve on his example. Even ostensibly moderate leaders in ostensibly moderate Muslim countries are of the opinion that even if beheadings and stonings and cutting off the hands of thieves aren’t standard practices currently, they will be, once “purely Islamic” government is in place.
The traditions are designed to carry on. And so are the old hostilities. In Mohammad’s time, on the Arabian Peninsula, the Muslims were few and the Jews were many; the Jews represented a real threat to the burgeoning plan to spread the new religion far and wide (plus there was booty to be had by attacking the Jews).
The Jews, who today amount to one quarter of one percent of the world’s population, and are only a tiny fraction of the people residing in the Middle East, still give Muslims the vapors. The Islamists can’t get over their ancient grudges because their religion tells them that the holy books say what they say, and nothing has really changed; and furthermore, that to abandon those old grievances means abandoning their religion. Christians may be born with Original Sin, but the Muslims are born with Original Anger, and a mandate to remake the world in the image of a seventh century warlord.
There are a host of problems particular to the parts of the world that consider themselves Muslim land. And there is an almost unwavering conviction, handed down over fourteen centuries and still going strong, that the problems in those countries will disappear if they just get a little more Islamic - that the source of all the trouble is not too much religion, but not enough of it.
Meanwhile, since they’re having so much trouble getting the purest of Islamic societies off the ground in those countries, why not branch out into Europe, where tolerance is practically a religion in itself? What more fertile ground to impose an imperialist and autocratic theocracy than a region of the world steeped, as is Europe, in self-effacement and self-castigation and rendered utterly incapable of defending its own traditions? Multicultural claptrap evidently means never being allowed to cast a critical eye on any culture… except one’s own.
We in North America need to remember that what is happening in Europe now will happen here later - and not necessarily much later.
Christians have been proselytizing since the beginning, so trying to convert the unconverted isn’t specific to any religion, including Islam. There has been blood spilled and ample cruelty committed in the name of Christianity. The difference is that the violence wasn’t built into Christianity; it’s not part of the fabric of the religion – and it has always been lamented afterward. None of that is true of Islam, where everything good that has ever happened is “…thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword.”
“Islam is a religion of peace.” —George W. Bush
“Those who know nothing of Islam pretend that Islam counsels against war. Islam says: Kill all the unbelievers just as they would kill you all! ...Kill them, put them to the sword and scatter [their armies]… Islam says: Whatever good there is exists thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword!” —Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
If you don't know which one is right, you haven’t been reading your Koran.
We might as well start off right here with the usual chin music about how “most Muslims are peaceful and blah, blah blah…” It’s a fact. Most Muslims didn’t pick the religion; they were born into it. To them, it seems to have its good points; and it sure helps keep the kids in line. Still…
Most Muslims don’t strap bombs to themselves or fly airplanes into buildings; but at least a reported 28% admit that they think activities like that are justified “in some cases.” That’s also a fact, whether we like it or not (we don’t).
It’s a topic of discussion that has the demonstrated capacity to drive its enthusiasts to homicide. Somali-born Ayaan Hirsi Ali collaborated in Denmark with Theo Van Gogh (a distant descendant of the painter) to make a seemingly harmless little film about some of the travails of women under Islam; Van Gogh was murdered in the street for his trouble. Hirsi Ali has been under round the clock protection ever since: the killer left her a threatening letter spiked into his victim’s chest. According to that young enthusiast and a lot of others of his ilk, the like-minded devotee who kills Hirsi Ali gets a one-way, first-class ticket to paradise.
Speaking of Denmark, a few cartoons get published and there are riots in the streets. More than a hundred people die in the aftermath.
Speaking of riots, thousands run amok in Paris night after night, setting cars and buildings on fire. The authorities blame the “unrest” on “disaffected youth” and possibly “marginalization” and maybe even “racism.” But nobody’s fooled by the doubletalk, including the ones doing the doubletalking. They’re just trying to manage the havoc.
Speaking of havoc… the Pope quotes a leader of the long-gone Byzantine Empire and his observation that Islam has been spread by the sword (see the Ayatollah, above). More riots ensue, more people die. More “disaffected youth” march in the streets and clamor in London parks waving signs that say, “BEHEAD THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM,” and “SLAUGHTER THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM” and “BUTCHER THOSE WHO INSULT ISLAM.” The message: “Kill anyone who says ours is a violent religion.”
The problem is that Islam HAS been spread by the sword - or the threat of the sword. The great armies of Islam weren’t overrunning southern Europe to ring doorbells and sell cookies. There was mass killing, and lots of children and women sold into slavery, and copious booty carried away. There was plunder, wreck and ruin.
But that was then; what does that have to do with now? Why bring all that unpleasantness up? Besides, “the Crusades were violent, too, and blah, blah, blah..." That’s also a fact.
Setting aside all the historical arguments against that comparison, the comparison still doesn't wash; we are left with a single, unimpeachable fact: one group's violence doesn't mitigate another's. And here is a comparison we should make, and should keep in mind: the Crusades ended centuries ago; the Islamists are killing people now. Perhaps we should march in the streets to protest the launching of the eighth Crusade. Weren't the first seven enough? Let's make a note to get a consensus going on that, just as soon as we deal with what is happening in the world today.
The issue looms large, and promises to loom larger. The most popular name for newborns in England today is Mohammad. There are Muslim neighborhoods that are off limits to the police - in France. But that’s Europe’s problem, n’est-ce pas? No, it’s ours, too. Because there are plenty of imams (Islamic clerics) right over here on our side of the pond who dream out loud about the day when “the banner of Islam will fly over the White House.” How will that be accomplished? I refer you again to the words of the Ayatollah.
And they don’t just dream it; they mean it to happen. The religion tells them that the world is divided into “dar al-Islam” and “dar al-harb”: the House of Islam and the House of War. The House of Islam is wherever Islam rules over every aspect of life, including government, law, and every conceivable thought, word and deed.
The House of War is everywhere else. The Ayatollah wasn’t the only one who recognized that his religion says it is required of every Muslim to make war on everyone, everywhere - until Islam rules the earth. When they talk about the inhabitants of the House of War, they mean us. That’s what the religion keeps reminding the imams, and that’s what they keep reminding the masses.
There is timelessness to the religion of Islam that most Westerners have trouble understanding. Mohammad lived in a violent world - but then again, he was committing a lot of the violence. And Islam says that he was the ideal man, the absolute best ever, and the example every Muslim should emulate, forever. Not just sort of emulate except for the icky parts; not an example that needs to be reformulated for modern times, like substituting the word “pester” for every instance of the word “kill”; but an absolute and timeless way for every true Muslim to behave.
To our modern sensibilities, lively activities like beheading enemies, stoning women to death, and cutting off people’s hands and feet seem a tad harsh. But Islam says that Mohammad did all these things, and ordered all these things to be done - and that no one should presume to improve on his example. Even ostensibly moderate leaders in ostensibly moderate Muslim countries are of the opinion that even if beheadings and stonings and cutting off the hands of thieves aren’t standard practices currently, they will be, once “purely Islamic” government is in place.
The traditions are designed to carry on. And so are the old hostilities. In Mohammad’s time, on the Arabian Peninsula, the Muslims were few and the Jews were many; the Jews represented a real threat to the burgeoning plan to spread the new religion far and wide (plus there was booty to be had by attacking the Jews).
The Jews, who today amount to one quarter of one percent of the world’s population, and are only a tiny fraction of the people residing in the Middle East, still give Muslims the vapors. The Islamists can’t get over their ancient grudges because their religion tells them that the holy books say what they say, and nothing has really changed; and furthermore, that to abandon those old grievances means abandoning their religion. Christians may be born with Original Sin, but the Muslims are born with Original Anger, and a mandate to remake the world in the image of a seventh century warlord.
There are a host of problems particular to the parts of the world that consider themselves Muslim land. And there is an almost unwavering conviction, handed down over fourteen centuries and still going strong, that the problems in those countries will disappear if they just get a little more Islamic - that the source of all the trouble is not too much religion, but not enough of it.
Meanwhile, since they’re having so much trouble getting the purest of Islamic societies off the ground in those countries, why not branch out into Europe, where tolerance is practically a religion in itself? What more fertile ground to impose an imperialist and autocratic theocracy than a region of the world steeped, as is Europe, in self-effacement and self-castigation and rendered utterly incapable of defending its own traditions? Multicultural claptrap evidently means never being allowed to cast a critical eye on any culture… except one’s own.
We in North America need to remember that what is happening in Europe now will happen here later - and not necessarily much later.
Christians have been proselytizing since the beginning, so trying to convert the unconverted isn’t specific to any religion, including Islam. There has been blood spilled and ample cruelty committed in the name of Christianity. The difference is that the violence wasn’t built into Christianity; it’s not part of the fabric of the religion – and it has always been lamented afterward. None of that is true of Islam, where everything good that has ever happened is “…thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword.”
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