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Violence in the Name of God »
Posted by: jovial 2 years, 8 months agoMurder and terror do not figure in the teachings of the monotheist world religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Yet time and again, their fanatical followers embark on bloody rampages, their rage fired up by zealous priests and religious scholars.
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jovial
Grew up In Brooklyn. Joined the Navy in 1976 stayed in 10 years. Aircraft Electronics tech. Worked for Major Govt. contractor then settled in California ...
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Comments: 286
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ADIMIN
Feb. 26, 2007, 4:39 p.m."Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction", Blaise Pascal
or to say it another way..
Even if you think that violence is wrong, when you KNOW that you're right, the end justifies the means.
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flyrod
Feb. 26, 2007, 5:35 p.m.Murder and terror even war are a big part of the teachings of the Bible. Maybe the author should read it before he reports such stupid things. Bloody rampages, zealous priests, and religious scholars. Makes us sound almost Islamic.
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Searchbeam
Feb. 26, 2007, 5:47 p.m.Every time a new religion emerges, it usually emerges in the dark shadow of failings of another religion, to resurrect human spirit and to guide it to a higher plateau.
However, the elements that caused the earlier religion to fail, have not disappeared. Invariably, they raise their ugly head again under the disguise of a new vision, new interpretation or a new twist to accommodate the earlier spurious elements.
Every religion has gone through this metamorphosis, eventually giving power to the mighty to twist the meaning and mantra of the glorious new vision.
For, religion does not exist in vacuum. It is a guidepost and searchlight for human beings to bring meaning into their lives. What demeans it is the flock that it is trying to guide.
Religions based on the absolutes are the most prone to this manipulation - religions like Islam.
Peace and Blessings! And Shalom, Om Shanti, and Salaam!
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samsara15
Feb. 26, 2007, 7:59 p.m.On the other hand, Communism certainly has provoked a lot of killing, and God is not part of its ideology. Absolutist thinking leads to killing, but some would claim it was moral relativism. A tangled web we mortals weave.
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jovial
Feb. 26, 2007, 8:06 p.m.What is terrorism? Could it be defined as the slaughter or harm of innocents to further a belief or political view? If that is the definiton, then haven't there been many examples of this in the Bible? "And I will stretch out my hand, and smite Egypt with all my wonders"- Exodus 3:20 If you remember the story along with the verse this is about the exodus of the israelites from Egypt. Some of the things that happened to the Egyptians as a result of Pharaoh's stubborness:
poisoning the water supply (turning water to blood),destroying the food supply,slaughter of innocent children (all the first-borns). It appears that there are a lot of acts that could be conceived as terrorism in the Old and New Testament. Just some food for thought. I am no Bible expert.
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Searchbeam
Feb. 26, 2007, 9:10 p.m.jovial,
Some say that the New Testament is a collection of books written by different people at different times, and eventually grouped together by a committee, with political agendas.
When Paul started bringing more people into the fold, it is claimed that he made several compromises and concessions not particularly liked by other apostles.
There is also the question whether the New Testament was written with compromises to avoid confrontation with the Roman rulers.
Christianity took another turn when Constantine became the first Roman emperor to accept Christianity, and apparently twisted the Bible's teachings to incorporate wars and conquests into the religious dogma.
Truths suddenly become lies right in front of our eyes! It is hard to say for sure what really happened some two thousand years ago!
Unless we receive Divine inspiration and see the Vision, we mere mortals are condemned to accept the stories told by others as the truth!
Peace and Blessings!
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espse
Feb. 27, 2007, 11:01 a.m.God, please smite all your believers. Do it now. Waiting....God, please smite something......smite me......nothing.......God, if you are there, send me a sign, otherwise I'm going to say you don't exist........ you chickens..t, you don't exist. I fart in your general direction.
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ASHADOW
Feb. 27, 2007, 11:25 a.m.The Bible is predictions by God! Read Psalms 83.
It is happing today. One makes an error if you read it like
a book. Churches say "Read the Bible this year"
Start Gen 1;1 finish in Revelation.
Try 1Peter 1:15-16. The answer is in Lev 11:46-47.
Use a New American Standard Bible. The others are
changed to confuze you.
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spkguy
Feb. 27, 2007, 11:31 a.m.Deepak Chopra:
Deepak, elbows on the conference table, hunched over a microphone, talking about God. "Christ wasn't a Christian and Mohammed wasn't a Mohammedan," he explains, obviously not for the first time. "Buddha wasn't a Buddhist. These are dogmas and ideologies. The fight is about semantics."
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spkguy
Feb. 27, 2007, 11:36 a.m.Dave: Is there a trait or a feeling readers of this book would share? Maybe a frustration with organized religion?
Chopra: In many cases, it's the simple fact that science and technology have dismantled our traditional beliefs. If we are aware what science has shown us, we can no longer think of God as a dead white male in the sky. We can no longer squeeze God into the volume of a body and the span of a lifetime. That limits God.
This is a huge universe. Planet Earth is a speck of dust in an unbounded expanse, an ocean of space-time. We're part of a little galaxy on the outskirts of infinity. A simplistic notion of God is no longer tenable.
Continued:
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spkguy
Feb. 27, 2007, 11:47 a.m.For more of the interview...
http://www.powells.com/authors/chopra.html
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braveone
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:08 p.m.Why do atheists fight so hard against something that they are convinced doesn't exist????
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MarsDlugosz
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:32 p.m.Religion = Dope. Dopes use religion. Think for yourself. Take resposibility for your actions. Put away the guns, crosses, bibles, swords, etc. Peace please.
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Dionys
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:34 p.m.Atheists have the biggest faith of all. The faith that they are, as individuals, possessed of the ultimate, undoubtable truth.
Unfortunately it doesn't make them any more "right" than anyone else.
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betruthful
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:34 p.m.All religions, known and unknown, started with a divine leader (Guru). All instructions given by these leaders were esoteric and were later interpreted mundanely. All talk of killing, separating mother and son etc., was meant as killing the ego, or evil in mans mind and turing from the world to God. These were later miss interpreted by the spirtually ignorant priest and exploited by the worldly leaders. When the Guru departs ( he/she only meant their teaching for their deciples that lived when they did) the teachings are bungled by the greedy ignorant priestly class left behind. No living true "Master" teaches violence or greed. Fallwell and the likes are mean spirited, ignorant,greedy men and should be ignored and laughed at-same for Islamic, Jewish or any other religious nuts.
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betruthful
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:43 p.m.As soon as money is involved, drop your interest in the "party" you are trying to learn from and seek another teacher. No true "Teacher" is interested in your money or your property.If the "teacher" makes his worldly living from his teachings ,find another. Keep looking your whole life, that is better than following some world religion that teaches death and hatred. Fallwell said "kill them all in the name of the Lord" as he wears $2000. suits and lives in a mansion paid for by poor people trying to buy their way into heaven.
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espse
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:48 p.m.Never underestimate the damage intelligent design does to our country. These revisionist insidious bible thumping morons will lie, steal, cheat, and lie some more to force their adgendas down the throats of children, in order to increase the size of their mega churches. American science is faltering, we are loosing to India and China, while these immoral liars are pushing Intelligent Design. Cowards used to call themselves Creationists, but they flip floped after the scopes monkey trial. They are a bunch of liars. They think the earth is 6000 years old. They are completly insane.
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betruthful
Feb. 27, 2007, 12:59 p.m.Can one believe the world is no more than 6000 years old if one does not have his/her head burried in the ground? When these people watch documentries and the phrase "a million years old" comes up, do they say " thats a lie". Do they not believe Dinasaurs existed,or that they existed along side of man? My oh my!
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braveone
Feb. 27, 2007, 1:19 p.m.todays date on the Jewish calender is 9 Adar, 5767
the calander starting at Adams creation from the dust of the earth.
the world was created much earlier.
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braveone
Feb. 27, 2007, 1:32 p.m.bored..........
so does anyone want to debate the subject of this blog?
did anyone read it??
have the ability to form a coherent sentence??
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spkguy
Feb. 27, 2007, 1:39 p.m."Question with boldness even the existence of God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear." 1787 Thomas Jefferson
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VisionA
Feb. 27, 2007, 1:58 p.m.Murder is a tenet in all the three mentioned religions. The tora, old testament and koran clearly chronicle god punishing dissidents by death. If we are created in his image why not do what he does? The same reasoning goes for increased violence in USA especially youth.
Bush practices violence for those (countries) who do not conform. Message is clear, if you dont behave the way I want, I clober you. What is youth going to do if you dont please him? He will clober you. What is good for the goose is good for the gander
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