They don't hate us, they love their God

You must have to be a real bastard to be their god.

I can see that premise. I can see a target for hate growing from that, though. Whoever THEY are, and that the target is particularized as time goes by.

I have no argument with those who would die for their religion. It's those who kill for their religion that scare me.

Most religions condone violence under certain conditions, but Islam seems to be more accepting, even encouraging, of violence.

Have you read the book, Looming Towers? The author gives a reason for the Taliban's extraordinary violence, especially against women, as coming from the many orphans of the war with the Russians. They were sent to Pakistan for safety, where they were put in Islamic schools and where they were commonly abused by older men. They never came into contact with women, which seems to have left them with no concept of women as human beings. Wish I could remember the name of the author.

Al Qaeda was actually trying to temper the extreme violence of the Taliban, but they still have engaged in such extremes themselves that it is difficult to tell the difference.

What I find hard to understand is the number of highly educated men who have gone over to radicalism. Even one of the men responsible for the attempted car bombing in London was a doctor and had the potential for a successful and constructive life. (Not sure if the one in Scotland was educated.)

Are we refering to the Muslims, the Christians or the Jews here? I'm a Buddhist so I know you ain't talking about me!

I'm sure that if you look at the scoreboard, Christians are still in the lead. This is mostly due to earlier works of the catholic church, but there have been flare ups since. I think that ina certain teenage stage of religion, a religion goes through a violent stage. This however may only be true of the Abrahamic faiths. I know little about the history of Buddhism and it's uses in war etc.

T
Knows little of the history of Buddhist warriors.
O

... and you don't have to be a real bastard to be yours? (I'm assuming you're either Christian or Jewish.)

"We have firm belief in God that our blood will lead to a revolution,"
Abdur Rashid Ghazi, leader of the Red Mosque in Islamabad now under seige by government forces in Pakistan.


Those in charge inside the mosque have so far refused to discuss surrender terms and are shooting any of the students who have attempted to flee from inside in the past two days. Women and children have not been allowed to leave.
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I'm not being cynical when I say this is for the love of god and where such love leads.

Afghanistan teeters on the end of chaos, Iraq is chaos even with the surge in full surge and doctors in Britain stack gas cans in BMWs.

President Bush believes he is doing his own Lord's work.
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When whoever survives all this digs us up in 5,000 years, do you think they will understand that we all killed ourselves in an argument over imaginary beings?

Joe("They apparently believed deeply in a love of extra-natural things.")Nation

You assume incorrectly.

If God were a live-in boyfriend we would look at the abuse and the neglect, shake our heads sadly and say :

"Why does Humankind stay with Him?"


Joe(who can He be reported to?)Nation

I certainly agree they love their god so much they do the most appalling things to appease him. (assume its him, it usually is).

So they detonate the bomb with a smile, believing they do the will of Allah.

Clearly if they thought they were disobeying Allah, they would be a little more reluctant to go and meet him.

Or at least stand well back from the explosion to give time for some repentance.

So they love their god, but I think they do also really hate us. Because their God hates unbelievers, or so they believe.

I'm not against religion per se, but neither do I accept all religions have equal moral worth, and there does seem to be a real problem with Islam and violence.

Diane- The name of the book is "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11".

Link to "The Looming Tower"

Have not read it, but will be ordering it. Sounds fascinating. Thanks for telling us about it!

Interesting aside:

This is a promotion from the site:

Perhaps Odie is somehow linked to this odious plot.?

neologist- Very strange juxtaposition. Usually, when Amazon has a twofer, the books are somehow related. Wonder what the connection is?

I love God enough that if he wanted it I would die for somebody else.
I've lived a bad life and i am only 11

clubpenguinrocks- Welcome to A2K!

People have free will. At 11, you are old enough to make the right decisions. No matter what you have done in the past, you can change your way of living, NOW.

As an 11 year old, you have not had the experience to make up your mind as to whether there even is a god, let alone that you want to die for the idea. Right now your job is to be the best person that you can be, and to learn more and more about the world, so that when you are older, and have more experience, you can make an informed conclusion about your relationship to the universe.

God, you see this horseshit all the time. What makes it the more pathetic is that buddhists peddle this crap just the way all other religions do: "we're not bad people, we're peaceful and enlightened--it's the other guys who are evil."

The Tendai sect of buddhists (the name is a Japanese pronunciation of T'ien-t'ai, the Chinese buddhist sect from which the Japanese temple foundation arose) not only involved themselves in temporal affairs, they rose to such prominence in imperial and shogunal affairs that there is an entire era in Japanese history named for them. The first Tendai foundation was at Mount Hiei near Kyoto (then called Heian), and increasingly, Tendai monks became involved in political affairs. They built their quartes in the Muromachi district in the city, and a period of more than 200 years, roughly corresonding to the Ashikaga shogunate is more commonly called the Muromachi period, because the buddhist monks became so prominent in the political affairs of Japan.

But it did not end with politics. Many of the Tendai monks became sohei, or warrior monks, who protected the political interests of the Tendai, establishing monasteries to train sohei warriors, and defying in arms the political rivals of the Muromachi bureaucrats.

A more extreme example is the Ikko-Ikki sect, which was centered around the Honganji-shima buddhist "cathedral" (more of a castle, and a military base, the name cathedral was give it by the Jesuits who record the history of 16th century Japan). The Ikko-ikki were militant buddhists of the Japanese Jodo Shinshu sect, derived from the Amida buddhists of China. They joined with shinto priests, peasants and disfranchised petty nobles to spread insurrection throughout Japan, in opposition to the Ashikaga shoguns, or anyone exercising authority. They commonly instigated riots, preferably lead by farmers, who occupied a special, privileged position in Japanese society.

During the Sengoku, or Warring States period in Japanese history (mid-15th to late 16th century), the sohei of the Tendai and the Ikko-ikki fought as private armies for their political masters. When Oda Nobunaga attempted the conquest of Japan, one of his first targets was the Mt. Hiei temple, and the monks of Muromachi. Having defeated them and burned the temple, he rounded up other sohei in Japan to fight for him against the Ikko-ikki of Honganji-shima. It took nearly 15 years to bring down the Amida buddhists of Honganji-shima, who allied themselves with the Mori clan, who supplied the island fortress from the sea. In the years that remained to him before he was assassinated, Oda Nobunaga sent the sohei to hunt down and round up or kill any sohei who were not pledged to his army.

Quite apart from this, many buddhists in all ages and in all countries have been willing to take arms for their or for someone's political masters. The diffidence of buddhists toward this material life has often, in fact, provided a rationale for participating in war. That they fought for no particular god does not absolve them of the responsibility for their violence. That they did not seek to convert anyone at the point of spear doesn't make their victims any less dead.

Fanatics not only love their god, they want their god to appreciate the depth of their love and adoration.

I have it, it looks good, and is "on my list".