As Congress is considering the extent of Islamic extremism in America, scholars on both sides of the Atlantic wonder whether the liberal Protestant theology of the last two centuries must share some blame for the violence committed by Muslim radicals….
Liberal protestantism may be guilty of all sorts of intellectual atrocities, but this stretches conjecture a bit much. A stronger argument might be made for the effect of Roman Catholic terrorism in the Middle East during the Crusades on Islamic radicalism.
I am as opposed as anyone to the toxic effects of skepticism about the truth of the Bible. But surely the logic here is specious if not silly:
Surely that can’t be true. If, between the year 700 and 1700, Muslim theologians were all firmly convinced of the entire truth of the Christian New Testament, then they wouldn’t have been Muslims! From its very beginning, Islam has been based on a rejection of several key claims in the Christian witness, including the idea that Jesus was crucified, died, buried, and rose again.
1, Dan, Islam expanded at the point of the sword. The Crusades were the Christian reaction to recover what the Muslims had conquered.
A lot of interesting speculation and food for thought in Simeon-Netto’s article. Although I don’t think Islam needed modern Scripture scholarship for us Christians to all be classified as “infidels” in their eyes. But the quote from Akinola about the homosexualization of the mainstream Protestant churches being a “diabolical” assault is very likely true.
This theory is obviously flawed in numerous ways. For one, Islamic forces were expansive in Europe long before the Enlightenment or the Reformation, from the invasion of Hispania and the Battle of Tours in 732, through the fall of Constantinople in 1453, right up to the Siege of Vienna in 1683. And here’s news for you, Indian Muslims didn’t hate the British because of liberal Protestant theology, that hated the British because they felt enslaved by the Raj. It may have given Islamic scholars like Kairanavi an intellectual line of attack, but they were looking for a line of attack anyway.
I for one do not like stirring up anti-Islamic rhetoric, but Bro. Michael is right, the conflict between Islamic civilization and the West did not begin with the Crusades, it was started in the 7th century by the Muslim invaders, which modern Islamic scholars conveniently ignore when using the 12th century as a rhetorical bludgeon.
Actually that last sentence should say “modern Islamic scholars and secular Western liberals”.
Is Brother Michael suggesting the atrocities of the Crusaders against the Muslims and their Christian brethren of the East justified?
7, No. No more than the atrocities of the Muslims against the peoples they conquered and enslaved prior to, during and after the Crusades were justified. But maybe, just maybe the Crusades would not have happened if Islam had not resorted to military conquest and expansion.
Br. Michael is absolutely correct. The military expansion of Islam was stopped at Tours, France in the West and outside Venice in the East (read up on the Battle of Lepanto)! The crusade to retake the area of Palestine from the Muslim invaders and restore it to Christian rule had no less justification than the retaking of southwestern France and Spain from the Muslim invaders. Truth be told, the Balkans and Turkey should be Christian, as well as all of North Africa and Palestine (to include Syria and Jordan). Islam stole these lands from the Holy Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, and the Coptics at the point of the sword. These were Christian lands and Islam stole them. Discussions of Christian atrocities (especially without any balancing discussions of Muslim atrocities) completely miss the point that it is Islam that was the aggressor and non-of those atrocities would ever have happened if Muslims had not invaded Christiandom. There is a myth that Christians started the fight with Islam and those that perpetuate it are bloody liars akin to holocaust deniers.
Typo: “…none of those atrocities…”
As a retired history teacher in a public high school who has studied and taught world history extensively, I know Sick and Tired and Br. Michael are absolutely correct. And one does get tired of the mass media telling the same old tired lies about Christian-Moslem History. They don’t even want to report on today’s regular, incessant violence directed against “infidels” of any sort in virtually every country or region where Moslems are the majority.
9. Sick and Tired, this explains the Islamic symbols, and in particular, the [b]scimitar,[/b] the [b]’sword of Islam.'[/b] Two of the goals of the Islamic fundamentalists are the reestablishment of the [b]Caliphate[/b] and the re-conquering of Spain and the other territories once held by the [b]Mohammedan rulers[/b] of that part of the world by armed conquest.
Get a grip Dan. The Crusades need no apology. They were a noble undertaking. Were their abuses? You bet, just as there were atrocities committed by Allied troops in WWII, but that didn’t make the defeat of Nazism and the Japanese aggression any less justified.
I agree entirely about the Crusades.
In relation to the article, I think there are some good points there, albeit it draws too long a bow.