Because this is an obvious reply to me and you have made valid points I will reply to you but I dont intend of making it a habit in this thread as I dont think it will go anywhere.
.. I've said this a million times and will say it again. Certain Islamic leaders incorrectly use parts of the Quran and Hadith, to motivate extreme acts from individuals that are basically suicidal and have lost hope or people that are easily manipulated.
True, but the Quran allows itself to be interpreted as such because those passages exist. Its not like the Quran says "Love everyone" and some mad man misinterprets this as "Kill them all." The Quran says "cut their heads off." People read that and cut their heads off. The Quran doesnt exactly make it a stretch of reasoning to come up with these ideas.
Anybody that has a comprehensive understanding of the religion will tell you that Islam does not promote terrorism. Islam promotes justice.
I guarantee you that the majority of those people in that video clip have a "comprehensive understanding of the religion" and they will tell you differently. And justice is relative to the perception of those issuing it. You may think it is justice to stone homosexuals and commit honor killings, I do not.
These acts that you hear and read about are not and can not be considered jihad.
Once again the people in the video and the millions of others like them will differ with you on that opinion because the Quran gives them reason to do so.
In order for Muslims to go for Jihad (btw the word jihad has several different contexts) but when referring to Holy War, an Islamic Caliphate must declare it. An Islamic Caliphate does not exist. Therefore Jihad can not exist.. Jihad is also governed by many laws, for example it is absolutely forbidden to kill innocent people.
Yet the Quran has as so many what can only be called loop holes people still declare Jihad and innocent people still suffer and die.
Let me break it down further, when looking at Islam, you can not just look at the text and be like hmm ok I get it. Because you need to understand that according to Islam, verses were revealed at different times. There's a popular verse that is used as propganda against muslims,as well as used by muslims as propaganda to create extremist. And to paraphrase, it says something about 'killing the kaafir (or chopping off their heads) wherever you see them'. This verse was revealed at a time of war, and was referring to the opposing army. It was not referring to random non muslims. In fact it was not even referring to any war, it was a commandment passed down for that particular battle. Now its easy to see how someone can take that verse and completely misinterpret it, if they look no further into it.
If this book is so holy and was written by Allah why is it so hard to understand? Why all the misinterpretations. Why not just say "dont kill them" or "cut their heads off in this particular battle but not later on?" The fact that the Quran can not be updated gives people the reasoning to look into past examples. There is no new Quran, so in their eyes, because it was once acceptable to murder people in that war, they are allowed to do it again in this "war." This is the fault of the religion and the Quran because it gives people bad examples to follow. Like I said, it preaches brutality.
I've seen a lot of discussion about how brutal Islamiclaw/shariah is, for example, cutting the hand of a thief. Ok personally i sit there and go, holy shit, thats a bit over the edge! But then i think about the flip side, that if i lived in a society like that I dont think i'd have to worry much about somebody stealing my wallet, u know? Annd again, I was reading somewhere that the laws past down were meant to be extreme and make people feel uneasy, so that nobody would dare commit such an infraction.
These are brutal out dated laws. They had their time in Christian nations but luckily our societies grew and got rid of them as we found better ways of punishment. Islamic nations that still do this live by the same rules the rest of the world lives by in the dark ages.
Luckily for everyone Christianity, which was the ruling religion, grew and evolved past these primitive methods. If Islam had done the same the world would be a lot more peaceful.
As far as equality is concerned. You're absolutely right. Islam does not promote equality. Islam promotes Justice.
Whose justice? It doesnt promote my justice at all. It promotes its own justice which is very, very, very biased in its own favor.
To me personally justice is more important than equality. The reason is that equality is an illusion, it doesn't exist anywhere on the planet. You may not agree with what Islamic rulings advocate as just, which is fine. No religion treats everyone equally, people make it sound like Islamis the only religion that says you will go to hell if you dont follow God's commandments that are outlined in their respective holy books.
The difference is that modern Christianity does not preach murder as a punishment, it says that God will sort them out once they die. Islam expects its followers to act out this justice on its behalf, which is wrong and what causes all the conflict.
I personally have met people Jews and Christians (especially christians) that tell me to my face that i'm going to burn in hell for an eternity.
But none of them tried to cut your head off or preached anything to that nature. Luckily their opinion is only that, an opinion, they do not act on it.
"we are right because God says so,"... HA! c'mon dude u sounding like you never ran into those christian missionaries in the inner cities trying to convert anybody and everybody of color, and their only reasoning behind all their statements is "cuz god said so!"
Converting and killing are two totally different things.
.. at the end of the day man the way I look at it, any religion is poisonous when misused. I just think real Muslim leaders need to step up and kill the ignorance plaguing their lands... But then again some would argue that the west is more scared of that than the ignorant extremist u see here n there.
peace
I agree, any religion is dangerous when misused. But like I said, the difference is Christianity has evolved past the acts it carried out during the dark ages and crusades, Islam doesnt want to.
A lot of individuals do. A lot of Muslims live good lives, because their ideas have evolved and modernized, they dont exact justice on people in their community, they just live life the way they want to. But Islam as a whole, because it is in control of so many countries does not want to evolve as it will mean a loss of power.
I look at it this way, yes, there are terrible terrible Christians out there, but by large we do not let them attain power and we do not follow what they say. I am confident in saying that there are a lot more "normal" Christians than there are extremists. I think that it is pretty fair to say that extremist Christians are a minority.
On the other hand, I think it swings the other way with Islam. I believe that the good Muslims are a minority. And thats a shame, and something I very desperately hope changes before the religion's name is tarnished forever.