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Apple Mecca: Our Open Letter to Radical Muslim Politburo

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Pinkie,thank you for my Beet of the Week award.
I was so proud to receive an award from the eminent Ms. Pinkie(I even showed the spousal unit :))....Until I read Sister M.O.'s post on 9/21. Then I realized that my very first award here should rightfully go to the Sister.
I will cherish the memory of my fleeting award,though,Pinkie.

Brilliant post,Sister Massively Opiated.

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Comrade Hussies n' Thingies,

Thank you for your kind words, but no.... Pinkie's Beet is a thing of value and only she can rightly bestow it. Sister Commissarka Pinkie is wise, particularly in the way of root vegetables, and no one among us can wield a shovel as she can... She is an artist with that shovel, and can turn an entire field without dulling it or once hitting a wayward stone. Nor have I ever seen her accidentally cut into a potato while digging it up. It might be said to be almost a spiritual calling were spirituality not anathema to the Cube (except as it relates to The Obamessiah and The Church of Latter Day Climatology - a.k.a. The Goremans)... In the middle ages, she would either have been hailed as a champion tuber dowser or burned as a witch for her shoveling talents. So, you must not minimize your contributions...

You would not have had The Beet bestowed upon you were you not worthy (though, of course, the bestowing of The Beet does not constitute having won anything as this would implicitly denote competition, and so The Beet must be understood to be a reflection of the positive effects that The Peoples Cube has had on you, and we rejoice communally).

And so, Congratulations to us all!

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Commissarka Pinkie wrote:Oh, Red Square? Hello, Glorious Leader!

I think it's time to replace the No-Islamowacko Strip on this thread.

That first one worked really well. Over 90 days, just like the package said.

Pinkie,

Having almost readied the apartment for my return, including routing several nests of Kulak monsters, I find that no where north of the 49th are No-Islamowacko Strips available... not even at CheMart... and having spent several nights surfing the upper levels of the cable channels and finding no television ad for them (I am exhausted), I must ask, where do you think I can find these in Kanadistan... I have some like that keep away horseflies, but we are overrun with Islamowackos this time of year (well... all year round), but they seem worse this year than ever, now that some Kadrs might be released from Gitmo... is there a homemade recipe for them?

Your help is dearly appreciated.
Best
SMO

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What about a salami? If the pork doesn't do it you can wield it over the head...or elsewhere.

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Sister Massively Opiated wrote: is there a homemade recipe for them?

SMO,

Here's what you do. Get yourself a couple of strips of bacon, hang them from your door, and viola! No islamo wackos are going to come a knockin'. Of course the bacon needs to be replaced every two days at least or it gets kinda smelly. Maybe coating them in a thick coat of laquer? Hmmm. Anyone know if the islamo tards need to smell the bacon to be repelled or is a simple visual enough?

O'Brien

WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

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Comrades Theocritus and O'Brien,

I thank you for your words of wisdom. Unfortunately, the Kulaks are fond of luncheon meats and the like and so I'd be trading one problem for another... and given that a teenage Kulak monster will spoil a pound of perfectly good koffee beans just for the destructive fun of it, never mind stealing more butter than I can store, while an Islamowacko seems to have an almost religious respect for koffee, I think that in the short term, at least, I prefer to keep the Kulak monsters out of the apartment... besides, a Kulak monster must be killed over and over, returning to life with each full moon, unless it is buried in the dirty kitty litter surrounded by garlic, and it's just so messy (plus, if you remember, I lost my favourite knife last year having buried in the top of a young monster's head when he made off with my treasure Peoples Cube and began to paint different colours on it.... I caught it before the paint dried and restored it to its solid lustrous red, but it was close... I believe there are pictures posted somewhere.. ah yes... here it is... you will see my best knife, stuck, in the little beast's head... in any case, we my not need the strips for a while. Only this morning one of the group that was arrested two years ago for plotting to kill our Prime Minister was found guilty of planning terrorist activity, which is a miracle in itself as he was under age when arrested which usually means he would be sent home to his family where he would be roudly awarded for following in the steps of his Islamowacko anscestors and mullah... in any case, I believe we may have some time before the need for stips becomes critical, and I will continue to search, as well as try to produce some homemade strips... But thank you all for your suggestions...

Yours in housekeeping
SMO

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Sister Massively Opiated, at NPR we use the Kulak Monster House. The Kulak Monster House is sort of like those hotels for other pests. Like roaches and rats and other class enemies. But the Sovnarkom-issued Kulak Monster House looks like rich Kulak farm house. Little, like doll house almost. Stocked with what looks and smells like cute little overstuffed bags of grain, beets, potatoes and rich dark coffee beans. The greedy Kulak Monster sneaks in but it never comes back out. Lasts for a week. Then you take it to Post Office. It's all set up to post to the RNC in Washington D.C. Let them bury their own.

Dennis T Mccullough
Host of NPR's Big Rock Candy Mountain NewsForum


evict/impeach

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SMO,

Thank you for your kind words, and for posting the link that takes us back in time to the first appearance of the Kulaks and when you acquired your current avatar.

In regards to the No-Islamowacko Strip, that nice helpful man in the orange smock at Home Depot told me it's just been taken off the market. Apparently some offended Muslims (but I repeat myself) proclaimed a fatwah on the president of the company that manufactured them. As the president is also one of Obama's Ambassadors, in addition to ending manufacture of the No-Islamowacko Strip, he's agreed to sell his company and pledge all proceeds to education programs devoted to teaching sensitivity to the sensitivities of the sensitive Muslims.

I thought Theocritus and O'Brien had some good ideas about putting out pork products (I myself pictured a pair of pigs' feet in place of the door knocker), but after you explained the impracticality of that, I wondered if perhaps hanging up a picture of Miss Piggy might not do the trick.

She's female, porcine, and is a proponent of mixed marriages. This goes beyond race and religion; if memory serves, she's always been in love with a frog.

Dennis might know more on that subject, if he can stop hiccuping "impeach/evict,,,,," long enough.

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Commissarka Pinkie wrote:Dennis might know more on that subject, if he can stop hiccuping "impeach/evict,,,,," long enough.

Pinkie, you sweet young thing. That's why I'm just crazy crazy crazy for you! You like hiccup music too. But I can do a lot better than hiccuping. A lot better, baby. I've been practicing my burp music. How would you like to be serenaded by me, yours truly, Dennis T Mccullough? I'll be there below your window tonight. I've been taking lessons. I can drink a Hillary Jones soda and burp "impeach evict" to the tune of "How to Handle a Woman" while banging out the beat on a gas can. If I say so myself I burp a good tune. I'll be there for you, Pinkie.

You're mine!

evict/impeach

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Dennis, am I gonna have to call Charlene Darlin and tell her you are cattin' after another?

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I want to see people who stay in one room at the back of the hotel and shinny up into the second story.

Pinkie, I also quite like the idea of putting up a picture of Miss Piggy, and would do so but for the fact that I let Bruno put up a picture of her--she's his hero. Heroine. Self-absorbed, mean and cruel, and unlike the MTE hasn't ridden him around the swimming pool with stolen cowboy spurs. But when the MTE came to the Rancho she saw the picture of Piggy. She was incensed. Because she hadn't gotten a royalty for what she supposed was a picture of her.

Do the Comrades know that our Many Titted Empress is an absolute sucker for pork? I don't know if it's some sort of cannibalistic <i>presque vue</i> or if she just likes it. But it will play hell with getting on good terms with Iran's president Ahbeenafuckingjerk when it's time to figure out which red state gets nuked to make sure that 2000 doesn't happen again.

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Commissar Theocritus wrote:But it will play hell with getting on good terms with Iran's president Ahbeenafuckingjerk when it's time to figure out which red state gets nuked to make sure that 2000 doesn't happen again.

Hillary doesn't need to go to those extremes to make sure 2000 doesn't happen again. The only reason the Democrats lost is because they weren't getting their message out. Democrats just have to yell louder. Get right in people's faces and really yell.

Besides, I don't think Ahbeenafuckingjerk considers Hillary to be honest and trustworthy enough to help him nuke and mass murder a small town let alone an entire state.

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My lord, Margaret, where has the world gone with Ahbeenafuckingjerk and Our Many Titted Empress aren't doing each others' pedicures? Well, her hooves. His trotters. Our Many Titted Empress in all of her splendiferous glory is dedicated to the complete and total control of everything on earth, even unto the orbits of the electrons round the nucleus. As is Ahneenafuckingjerk.

Oh. I get it. An irresistible force and an immovable object. How fortunate for her to have found a use for her ginormous ass.

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Dearest Theo,

Do you not remember our discussion of last year... or so... we worked through the quantum mechanics of our Empress' black hole, and came to the conclusion that as long as we kept her out of the vicinity of anyone else who was also the centre of the universe, that we could avoid total annihilation... and as she's currently residing a The Ranch, and has been for some time... well... I'm sorry brother, but the fate of the universe is in your hands... The good news is that as long as we can keep her ginormous ego in balance with her ginormous ass, and orbiting Bruno stably, El Rancho Abismo shouldn't disappear up it's own black hole...

As an extra precaution, we should also probably try to keep her from visiting that Swiss spa... all those experiments they're doing at CERN around about Geneva with the Large Hadron Collider might be just the thing that tips the scales and keeps one of their "temporary" little black holes open... I'd really prefer not to try and reside too close to a neutron star for the time being... I find the world's gravitas a bit too much to bear at times already...

But I've Bohr'ed you enough for the moment...
Your Comrade in Bullshit
SMO

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BTW Theo,

As you can account for Ahbeenafuckingjerk, might you also know where our diminutive North Korean friend is hiding?... He can't possibly be in residence in Pyongyang, as there's been some talk of rebuilding the nuclear reactor they so ably blowed up real good last year, so I thought perhaps he was up at The Ranch baking up some yellowcake with her Weightiness and Ahbeenafuckingjerk. I think I saw an ad for a show they're doing for The Food Network when I was channel surfing for NoIslamowacko Strips the other night...

Any news would be greatly appreciated as we're all a bit worried about the little guy...

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Sister, I do confess that Dear Leader us here at the Rancho del Rio Grande, in residence with Our Many Titted Empress, whom, I'm glad to say, I've weaned off her normal breakfast of sliced children on toast.

I also have in residence Ahbeenafuckingjerk, and he and Dear Leader get all hot and bothered about hair. Dear Leader's hair, which gives a new meaning to <i>en brosse</i>, Abheenafuckingjerk, however is rather simeon, but is glad that his legs are not now readily mistaken for chicken legs. They were once, when Bruno put on some depilatory cream and our Empress, hung over from her Bloody Marys, and I do mean that, squinted one eye shut and yelled, "Popeye's!" And chased him around the swimming pool. She carries her own Sabatier cutlery.

Now thing are back to normal. One of Bruno's duties is to use a weed-eater on Our MTE's legs; Bruno, idiot that he is, sometimes has a fit of housekeeping come on him and Dear Leader looks so much like a toilet plunger when asleep that he now never takes off his glasses, and Ahbeenafuckingjerk keeps on talking about killing the infidels but it's hard to take seriously when he jumps on a chair and screams any time a cockroach walks into the room.

This is Texas, you know, with huge cockroaches, and to tell them apart from the cats Calvin and Hobbes I have to count the legs, but you'd think that someone building a reactor wouldn't scream like Lucille Ball on a chair when he saw one.

Anonymous
dear all non-Muslims,

i just want to say, where you are going wrong is at understanding the sensitivity of the situation and understanding the love or Muslims for Islam. i know its hard to understand unless you 'revert' (convert in your words) to Islam.

when you love something or someone so much then you dont want to hear anything against them. like your parents. btw Islam is way more than our parents for us. for us even mimicking Islam/sacred places/personalities is an insult because it is just too high to be made fun of or even copied. specially when you know it is the truth. If you knew that it was truth and you were not ignorant like all other careless non-Muslims you would not do any of that.

The intention might not be bad behind these things, like to hurt or insult or harm Muslims.But we ARE badly hurt and disturbed when you do these things.

Hope that helps make you understand the Muslim sentiments.

ARMAGHAN AHMAD

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Dear Armaghan Ahmad,

First, let me please compliment you for writing honestly and sincerely about something that you clearly feel strongly about, rather than simply writing a rage-filled hateful rant. You clearly want to help people understand your position in a respectful manner. Thank you.

That said, I believe our difference in opinion lies not in what you believe but the way some of your fellow Muslims practice 'submission' or 'surrender' (as that is what my understanding of the word 'Islam' means - to submit). I do understand what you are saying. However, I cannot equate your love and your desire to show absolute respect to your religion, with the behaviour of those who react violently to even the expression of disagreement with the tenets of Islam. I believe from reading your post, that you are someone who would not respond violently to someone who disagreed with your religious beliefs. You might disagree with them, and you might pity them for not sharing your beliefs in what you say is the ultimate truth, but would you kill them for not believing the same things you do?

Even within Islam, there are those who are so incapable of respecting another's right to disagree with them that they behave violently toward each other. How else can one explain Shi'as and Sunnis killing each other? If you believe that Islam is the one true religion, does that mean that you believe that Christians and Jews do not have a right to exist, and if you believe that they don't have a right to exist, are you willing to kill them for not believing the same things you do? Do you believe that Jews have no right to exist and that the State of Israel should be pushed into the sea and all it's inhabitants drowned?

I believe that you have the right to believe anything you wish to, and I respect the fact that you are devoted to Islam. That is your choice. You may not respect the fact that I do no believe in Islam, and that is your choice. But does it then follow that I do not have the right to exist? Does it then follow that if I am not willing to submit to Islam that I should die?

If your answer is no, then we have no argument and we disagree about nothing except what faith or religion we follow. No one wishes - I should not say that as I can only speak for myself - I do not wish to disrespect Islam or your beliefs, but I also believe that I have a right to disagree with you and to do so through humour. I disagree with certain Christian beliefs, and certain Jewish beliefs, and certain Buddhist beliefs and certain Hindu beliefs, and I believe that I have the right to voice that disagreement in a humourous manner. I believe that there is humour that is simply funny and humour that is offensive, but the place I draw the line is different from the place someone else would. I might be offended by another's humour or making light of something that is of ultimate importance to me and to what I fundamentally believe, but I would never kill them for expressing their beliefs, humorously or otherwise, whether I found it offensive or not.

And this, unfortunately, is where my, and I believe many other peoples issue lies with Islam, or with some (and I stress some) Muslims - the idea that whether or not you agree or disagree with us, or are offended or not, that does not give one the right, EVER, to kill someone. Sadly, even if you are entirely peaceable, there are many Muslims who are not, and who would respond to any perceived insult, intentional or not, justified or not, with violence, and no matter how much you love Islam or how devoutly you practice your beliefs, as long as there are those who would kill others for disagreeing, or even finding humour in a manner that offends, we will have a fundamental disagreement. I cannot condone violent reaction to those who disagree with your beliefs, whether they do so plainly or through humour.

So, I respect your right to believe whatever you wish, but please understand that we are not making fun of you, or your beliefs, or your sacred places or personalities in order to offend you - whether you can differentiate or not. We are directing our humour at those who react violently to disagreement, and who not only cannot respect our right to believe what we wish, but who would kill us for disagreeing. What I find sad is that there is a history of great literature in Islam, of poetry, some of which are profoundly beautiful love poems, and others which are humourous and which find humour in satire - in examination of the human condition through Muslim eyes and which make light, not of Allah, but of people... Muslim people, some who might be defined as revered. Further, there is a history within certain Muslim cultures, though not recent, of tolerance within Islam, for other faiths, particularly of Jews, who were often considered talented artists, wise advisers, and equals. They were respected, and their difference of belief was not perceived as disrespect, and their freedom to practice their religion was not hindered.

That said, you write, "Hope that helps make you understand the Muslim sentiments." I have Muslim friends who would disagree with you and can find humour in their own beliefs. They are devout. And so I can only write that I hope this helps you understand (not "makes you", which implies force, whether intended or not) our sentiments and the place from which we speak. Not a place of disrespect for you, despite what you choose to believe, but of finding what humour we can in a wholly unhumourous situation, directed at those who are incapable of allowing that there are others who do not share there beliefs and who, for that reason alone, they are willing to kill. It is a way of taking power away from and intellectually disarming those who would kill us simply for disagreeing with them. And as long as there are those who would kill us for not sharing their belief in Islam, we maintain the right to laugh at them, as we would laugh at anything that seeks our destruction, because it is one way of disarming and taking power away from those who would see us terrorized and murdered.

So, again, I hope that helps you to understand our sentiments.
Respectfully,
Sister Massively Opiated.

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I love Big Brother, and The Party...and Victory Gin, too.

I used to say "I like turtles", but have 'reverted' to The Cube.




Comrade “Pul”
Tiglath-Pileser III
Over 2753 Years of Organizing Communities

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Nicely said, Sis. I tip my lid to your elloquence.

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Ivan Betinov wrote:Nicely said, Sis. I tip my lid to your elloquence.
as always, no?

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Good job, sister--I'd have thrown a bomb. Oh. I did throw a bomb. Comes from reading about Islam. Your way is better, if the person is reachable.

ZAK
OK, OK..Enuff chirping dear hatchlings..
wateva u say, evrything deserves proof...
and the bottom line, is that ISLAM is the fastest groing religion in the world..
nuff said?
& after 9/11 islam is growing in USA faster than ever...why? u may ask?
coz instead of denegrating convos such as this page, people actually started finding out about islam, and wat ISLAM is really about...
wen i say ISLAM, im referring to the actual religion, and not its necesarily
followers...
jist sum food 4 thawt, the literal meanin of ISLAM, translates in english to PEACE..
may we all be successfull..

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Dear Zak, or is it ZAK?,

As someone with a smattering of Hebrew, Arabic and bizarrely, Aramaic (because biblical Hebrew contains a large portion of the language spoken at the time it was first written, which was Aramaic. It is the reason Hebrew phrases such as Mah Sh'lomchah though ending in an 'ah' sound, are male... it is a contraction of Mah Shalom Atah... Atah meaning the masculine "you" in Aramaic, whereas in modern Hebrew, anything ending in 'ah' would be feminine... it means "how are you?" or perhaps more literally, "are things peaceful with you?"... I offer this little lesson simply as proof that I know what I claim to know... ).

So... we come to the meaning of the word Islam. In Arabic, "salaam" serves the same purpose that "shalom" does in Hebrew, coming largely as they do from the same root language. Just as someone would say "Shalom" in greeting or when saying goodbye in Hebrew, or "Shalom aleichem", which literally means "Peace be upon you" (sound familiar? If so, it is because you would say, "Allah, Peace Be Upon Him, or PBUH")... and oddly, the appropriate response is, ""Aleichem shalom,", or "Upon you be Peace"... So too in Arabic, one greets another with "Assalaamu Aleichum" (or aleikum, depending on the dialect, as there are many many Arabic dialects)... which means, oddly enough, "Peace be upon you"... and just as oddly, the correct response would be "Aleichum Assalaam," which means, "and upon you be peace"... and so I am fairly certain that 'Peace' in Arabic is "Salaam"... which leaves us with the mystery of what the word 'Islam' means, and if one is to look it up in any number of dictionaries, both online and paperbound, one finds that it is translated as "to submit" or "submission", as in to submit oneself totally to Allah.

So, you might say as often as you like that to you, Islam means peace, but literally, it translates as "to submit". It seems odd that this Jew knows more about (presumably) your language or the native language of your religion, or the Q'ran, than you do, though looking at your post, it is questionable if you know much about any language. But then, I have studied many religions... almost all of them, except perhaps.... well... no... I've studied Jainism and a range of cargo cults, and so I think I've earned the right to say I've studied most of earth's religions, and with a critical eye, since though I call myself a Jew, I am a Jew by birth and a Buddhist by practice (Zen, in particular, though I doubt you care). So, by all means, enjoy your faith and your practice of Islam, but I urge you to learn more about it, or find better teachers, because you appear to be sorely unenlightened about something you write so passionately, if not literately, about.

Peace be upon you
Sister Massively Opiated

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My dear SMO,

You have such a brilliant mind, and make such eloquent posts, that I almost balk at posting anything in your dolphin's wake.

Nonetheless, after reading the last two posts, of Peace vs. Submission, I'm reminded of one of my sisters who's four years younger than me. As a child, she was a spoiled rotten snotnose who always threw horrific, screaming, kicking tantrums if she didn't get her way. You told her "No" at your own peril; she made life hell for everyone in the house till she got what she wanted, and she always did. (Alas, she never got what she needed, if you get my drift.)

By the time I was 17 and moved out, she was 13 and very much running the house, deciding everything. My recently divorced mother didn't care; her only response to the complaints of the rest of us kids was, "Look, the only way we'll have peace around here is to let her have her way"--in other words, SUBMIT. SUBMIT to the tyranny, and only then can there be PEACE.

I don't know if that could be applied to Islam, but it's what I thought after reading the last two posts by Zak and SMO.

P.S. Oddly enough, my sister became more human after she moved out and got married. Maybe her husband beat it out of her, or was simply a good influence on her, I don't know. I scratch my head over that but can't complain.

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I am reading <i>Among the Believers</i> by V. S. Naipaul--perhaps the most observant writer I've read. He reports on people who talk about the "perfect freedom in Allah." The freedom after complete submission to the Koran. The freedom that you get when you have completely foregone all of your first duty as a reasoning human being--which is to reason--and submit, give over, everything that makes you a human being to some Middle Ages dogma.

Which is misogynistic, murderous, and because it believes that all you need to know is in the Koran, doomed to failure.

The repeating tocsin of the book is, "After failure what is left is the faith."

Because faith is what you have when you do not rely on yourself.

Not a bad thing if your faith is in something beneficent or even benign, but a very bad thing if your faith tells you to murder others who don't believe as you do. Perhaps so that they won't show you up as being utter complete failures.

"For after failure, there is the faith."

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Zak!

Put down that hookah and learn to spell. Punctuation would be nice too.

"fastest groing religion in the world...."

WTF does "groin" have to do with Islam?
A swift kick there might actually wake you up to the evil you support.

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... and to think I went out of my way not to make dink jokes...

I did think about making the point that if we all believed exactly the same thing, agreed to submit to exactly the same will, then we couldn't help but have peace, as both Pinkie and Theo pointed out, but the whole roll over and play brain dead thing (I'm sorry Betinov.... I didn't mean to invoke any upsetting images) just isn't me, or, I believe, any of us here at TPC... except, of course, when the Chairman goes a-touring in his Pope-mobile and throws change and victory vodka ration tickets to THE CHILDREN... then we all toe the Party line, pick up our shovels, and beat a path through those little shits to get what's ours... because that's what the Party wants... and we always do what the Party wants...

Hmm... wait... that sounds familiar... 'always do what.... wants'... Ohhh... that's what political satire means...

Learnin' something new every day...
SMO

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Satire? Satire? There's a picture of me, taken about 2006, in the closet somewhere...

Oscar? Oscar! Where are you?

ZAK
{i write in shorthand, its easier.}

SMO, i like the way u sound soo brite..and with so much conviction..
in arabic, root letters of a word, id what u use to define words.. islam, root letters being salama yaslimu.. which means peace.. and Islam, yes, duz mean to submit ie: to our creator...
but these are mere technichalities, and clearly, u havent researchd enuf bowt islam...
and pinkie, uve got the rong end of the stick..no1s talking bowt submission to any creation.. like ive said, islam means, submission to our creator...
wouldnt the creator of sumthin know whats best for his creation..
BUT, cumin bak to my point, if Islam was soo terrible, why are people acceptin it in such vast numbers?
thats wat im gettin at..
you'd expect that in america, after 9/11 was blamed on muslims, americans would run away from islam.. but on the contrary, americans are acceptin islam faster than ever, being the fastest GROWING religion in USA, and he rest of he world.
even scientists, after reading the quran, and cumin acros stuff therein, that was only discovered in the 20th cenury, thereafter accept islam..(read up the stuff in quran bowt embryology, and astrology)
but if u dont hav an open mind, then the results will be obvious..i mean, by way of example: u can pour how much water u want over a sealed bottle, the bottle will neva get full..

and to theo: u pulling quranic text owta its context.. for ur info, muslims are only allowed to engage in war as self defense.. condotions being that they arent allowed to kill woman, children, and disabled people,, not even permitted to destroy plants unnecessarily.. thats from the islamic ruling poin of view..

i dont mean to be boastful or nethn.. dats the stats

Search the Web on Snap.co
{i write in shorthand, its easier.}

SMO, i like the way u sound soo brite..and with so much conviction..
in arabic, root letters of a word, id what u use to define words.. islam, root letters being salama yaslimu.. which means peace.. and Islam, yes, duz mean to submit ie: to our creator...
but these are mere technichalities, and clearly, u havent researchd enuf bowt islam...
and pinkie, uve got the rong end of the stick..no1s talking bowt submission to any creation.. like ive said, islam means, submission to our creator...
wouldnt the creator of sumthin know whats best for his creation..
BUT, cumin bak to my point, if Islam was soo terrible, why are people acceptin it in such vast numbers?
thats wat im gettin at..
you'd expect that in america, after 9/11 was blamed on muslims, americans would run away from islam.. but on the contrary, americans are acceptin islam faster than ever, being the fastest GROWING religion in USA, and he rest of he world.
even scientists, after reading the quran, and cumin acros stuff therein, that was only discovered in the 20th cenury, thereafter accept islam..(read up the stuff in quran bowt embryology, and astrology) but if u dont hav an open mind, then the results will be likewise..
i mean, by way of example: no metter how much water u pour over a sealed bottle, it will remain empty


and to theo: u pulling quranic text owta its context.. for ur info, muslims are only allowed to engage in war as self defense.. conditions being that they arent allowed to kill woman, children, and disabled people,, not even permitted to destroy plants unnecessarily.. thats from the islamic ruling poin of view..

i dont mean to be boastful or nethn.. dats the stats


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Zak wrote:and to theo: u pulling quranic text owta its context.. for ur info, muslims are only allowed to engage in war as self defense.
Then why are you fucking killing innocent people like on 9/11? If you tell me that innocent people in the WTC were killed in defense then you're murderous thugs who need to be exterminated like rats and cockroaches.

If you really don't see that, then the 1400 years since your prophet came has been enough to breed you to be stupid. Why is it that <i>every single other group has advanced while you have slid back</i>?

Islam is the religion of failure. For after failure, all that is left is faith. And the laziness of not bothering to learn to type.

And I don't think that your brain, on evidence, is capable of understanding, relative rates of growth.

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Search the Web on Snap.co wrote: wouldnt the creator of sumthin know whats best for his creation..

I agree with you wholeheartedly that The Creator (ie God) does in fact know what is best for His creation. However, and this can be said for any religion, the self appointed interpreters of God or God's word do not.

God speaks to everyone individually prodding each of us in the right direction. The twisted sycophants who claim to know what God wants you to do are nothing more than power hungry troglodytes that feed on people's wants and desires for something to believe in.

"Listen to me!! God told me how you all should act and if you don't listen to me God will punish you!"

Pap.

Koresh. Hubbard. The Bagwhan. And a myriad of others. All have claimed God talked to them and told them the 'right way'. All are deemed wackos, some were even burned to the ground. Reasons why they were deemed wackos:
Koresh - having sex with all the kiddes. God sure isn't down witht that.
Hubbard - Not really talking to God per se but wacko because of the whole alien thing.
Bagwhan - Probably the whole give me all your money and I'll buy gold Rolls Royces thing

God loves his creation, just as you love your children and your family. So why would God tell one group of people to slaughter everyone else? That doesn't sound like love to me, it sounds like some kid that got bullied in school that wants to take blind revenge on the world. Would you slaughter your family and children?

Actually I guess that was a bad point because the answer to that question is yes you would.
Suicide bombings
Honor murders
Killing all non muslims

For a religion of peace there sure is a host of ways God wants you to kill people.

You say that Muslims aren't allowed to kill women and children and the disabled.
How many women died in the world trade center bombing?
How many children are killed in your suicide bombings?
How many women are murdered every year by your honor murders?
Or is your dirty little secret that you don't mention in your little awareness sessions and marches that those rules only apply to Muslims? That if someone is not a Muslim than they are not people and therefore the rules don't apply to them.

O'Brien

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ZAK wrote:{i write in shorthand, its easier.}

I try to write in standard English; it's easier for others to understand and I have this nutty idea that I might be taken more seriously.

and pinkie, uve got the rong end of the stick..no1s talking bowt submission to any creation.. like ive said, islam means, submission to our creator...
wouldnt the creator of sumthin know whats best for his creation..
BUT, cumin bak to my point, if Islam was soo terrible, why are people acceptin it in such vast numbers?

uve? I think UV rays . . . rong end of the stick? Do you mean the incorrect end, or are you doing a bad un-PC imitation of those Chinese waiters in A Christmas Story?

And cumin as I know it is a very spicy spice. I could go on about all the "textisms" that throw off this technophobic baby boomer, but it's almost my bedtime.

But no, I don't think vast numbers of people are accepting Islam--certainly not in the sense that they're converting to it. But I do believe they're submitting to it for fear they'll get blown up.

And please stop denying that you kill women, children, and the disabled, when there is so much evidence to the contrary, some of it linked right here on this thread.

Now you've made me grumpy.

User avatar
First the Mime, now the Shorthand Guy.

Reading Zak is like watching someone riding a unicycle in large polka-dot trousers while demanding to be taken seriously.

Or a spoiled punk kid with pierced lips and limited vocabulary demanding respect while not showing any to the other side.

Or the stuttering lisping lawyer in My Cousin Vinnie who was trying to convince the jury by making them want to get it over with so that they don't have to listen to him again and play the unnerving guessing game trying to figure out what he was really trying to say.

User avatar
Could Zak be a troll? There is something of the same sort of whining, self-justifying "it's all about me" self-centeredness that we find in the Mime and in the whining wussy Jodin.

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Search the Web on Snap.co wrote:{i write in shorthand, its easier.}

SMO, i like the way u sound soo brite..and with so much conviction..
in arabic, root letters of a word, id what u use to define words.. islam, root letters being salama yaslimu.. which means peace.. and Islam, yes, duz mean to submit ie: to our creator...
but these are mere technichalities, and clearly, u havent researchd enuf bowt islam...
and pinkie, uve got the rong end of the stick..no1s talking bowt submission to any creation.. like ive said, islam means, submission to our creator...
wouldnt the creator of sumthin know whats best for his creation..
BUT, cumin bak to my point, if Islam was soo terrible, why are people acceptin it in such vast numbers?
thats wat im gettin at..
you'd expect that in america, after 9/11 was blamed on muslims, americans would run away from islam.. but on the contrary, americans are acceptin islam faster than ever, being the fastest GROWING religion in USA, and he rest of he world.
even scientists, after reading the quran, and cumin acros stuff therein, that was only discovered in the 20th cenury, thereafter accept islam..(read up the stuff in quran bowt embryology, and astrology) but if u dont hav an open mind, then the results will be likewise..
i mean, by way of example: no metter how much water u pour over a sealed bottle, it will remain empty


and to theo: u pulling quranic text owta its context.. for ur info, muslims are only allowed to engage in war as self defense.. conditions being that they arent allowed to kill woman, children, and disabled people,, not even permitted to destroy plants unnecessarily.. thats from the islamic ruling poin of view..

i dont mean to be boastful or nethn.. dats the stats

Zak,

Thank you for the information on Arabic - I like learning new things and now I know something new. That's the most interesting thing about the world (or the universe entire) to me... that the only thing I know with certainty is how little I know. I don't try to sound bright. I just like knowledge and enjoy learning, and it is my honour to be surrounded by very smart and very wise teachers. That said, I must admit that I don't understand how you can essentially agree with me (that Islam means "to submit", and undoubtedly, this must mean to submit to a higher power, in this case, the will of Allah), and then tell me that this is just a technicality after arguing that Islam means something else entirely. To submit does not equate with 'peace'. They are, by definition, two distinct things, particularly if to submit to the will of Allah amounts to war, or worse, terrorism, for whatever reason. So I believe most deeply that it is more than just a technicality.

Then you go on to discuss submission to 'our creator'... but not everyone believes in the same thing you do, so again, your submission to the will of your creator may be at odds with my beliefs, and once again, may lead to 'not peace'. And this is an even more important point, when taken with your statement that Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. I don't dispute this fact. However, sadly, this scares me. It scares me not because I am afraid of Muslims, et al... as I have said, I have many friends who are Muslims... Actually, I thought about it the other night, and I think I have more friends who are Muslims than Jews, and again, this in itself does not frighten me. What frightens me is that you seem to put a great deal of stock in numbers... and as a Jew, this frightens me. This frightens me because for a very very long time, and perhaps always, there have been less Jews than any other religion, and as you well know, we have a history of being persecuted and often, massacred.

The Nazis were in the majority, but that does not make Naziism right.... and please, don't misunderstand... I am not equating Islam with Naziism, though I should point out that despite the fact that the Nazis also killed Muslims, there were Muslims who made pacts with them, just as the Catholic church and the Soviets did at different times. Hajj Amin al Husseini (Muhamed Effendi), also known as the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem (so named by the Brits, who had no love of the Jews either) exhorted all Muslims to support the Nazis in destroying the Jews, and he was only one of many. Whether you agree with him or not, if you rely on the concept of majority defining what is religiously correct or right, then you tacitly support, via the act of submission to the will of your creator, the destruction of those who do not believe in Islam, and you are no better than the Christians of Spain who forced Jews and Muslims to convert to Catholicism or die.

Also, you speak about studying the Q'ran and about Islam with an open mind, as if the fact that I have not converted and adopted hijab is proof that I am close-minded... or as you put it, a stoppered bottle that cannot be filled with water, assuming in this case that submission is water. But again, I disagree with you that simply because I have chosen a different religious path than you that I am close-minded. Further, simply because I have failed to jump on the Muslim bandwagon, along with the rest of the fastest growing religion, does not mean I am close-minded. It means that I do not believe the same things you do and just because "4 out of 5 dentists agree", doesn't mean that I do... Just because others have found Islam to their liking or it has resonated with them, does not mean that because it does not resonate with me that I am close-minded. I have, as someone who was born Jewish but does not practice, studied as many religions as I possibly could, and decided which resonated with me... which I could believe and put faith in (and to me, faith requires doubt... doubt and questioning strengthens faith). So, simply because I have not found Islam to be a religion that I can put my faith in, does not mean that I am incapable of being critical in my judgements or understanding, and simply because others have found it to be the right religion for them does not mean that it is the right religion for everybody.

And that is what does frighten me about your expression of Islam. You say that it is not a religion of war (though one may fight to defend themselves... true Christians would say 'turn the other cheek', though I don't know many who would... and I don't think that self-defence as a right is limited to Islam... I think it is anyone's right), and that any statement that says otherwise has been taken out of context, but the implications of your argument that I should accept Islam as the one true faith because everyone else is, is a frightening one... and as arguments for why I should believe in Islam, a pretty poor one... I should believe in it because it is the fastest growing religion is not a meaningful argument. I'm sorry... it just isn't a justification for conversion... In fact, it is the poorest justification for conversion... it's like saying "4 out of 5 doctors can't be wrong" except that you aren't discussion math (well you are, but not in the manner I'm referring to)... where fact is fact... you are saying that faith is fact, and in fact, it isn't... it's simply faith... I know you will disagree with this. All true believers take their religious doctrine as fact, but what they fail to differentiate is that they take the fact of their doctrine on faith... this may seem a confusing statement but it is not semantics... it is an article of faith that any religious doctrine is fact... period.

If the world worked like that... if your doctrine was fact, objectively, and nobody ever disagreed, on the basis of majority, we would still be living in a heliocentric universe rather than a heliocentric solar system, or worse, a geocentric universe. If the Catholic church had been allowed to continue to suppress the work of Galileo and Copernicus (who wouldn't even allow his work to be published until after his death), and if they continued to burn those like Geordano Bruno at the stake, we would live in a much smaller universe than we do now (and what is bizarre is that historically, Muslim astronomers and scientists were free thinkers until they eschewed science for submission)... What you argue for is that those who disagree with you should be silenced because they disagree with the majority. But then, religion is not democratic... A good argument for the separation of church and state, in my view.

Zak - I am not arguing that Islam does not have the right to exist. I am arguing that radical political violence - terrorism - justified on the basis of Islam by those who carry it out - does not have the right to exist.... any more than any terrorism justified on the basis of any religion has the right to exist. What you appear, and I stress the word 'appear', to be arguing is that other religions don't have the right to exist, and that terrorism is self-defence, which it is not. Perhaps I've misunderstood, which is why I say 'appear', but please tell me if I am wrong in this understanding. Not all Muslims would fly planes into buildings, thereby killing thousands of people, using Islam as a justification, and not all Muslims support the actions of those who carry out these acts. But terrorism and self-defence are two very different concepts, and neither has anything to do with religion. And you have no right to decide for me or for anyone else that I don't have the right to practice whatever religion I choose, or none at all if that is my choice, based on your choice of religion or the fact that others choose to adopt it as their faith.

And if you do believe that I don't have the right to practice whatever religion I choose, particularly when it has no effect on you whatsoever other than my existing in a state of disagreement with you, then and only then do we have a serious difference of opinion when it comes to faith, beside the fact that you appear to have no respect for me at all (I base this on the fact that you have stated that I am close-minded and wrong in not accepting Islam, simply because you say so). If you believe that your belief in Islam gives you the right to take away another's right to practice the religion of their choice, then you are wrong. The only way I would deny your right to PRACTICE your religion as you see fit is if in doing so, you used it as a justification for keeping me from practising mine, and/or used it as a justification for violence (and not self-defence, given that I've not attacked you)... and as long as you don't do either of these things, then I can only say that we must agree to disagree.

Ultimately, I am certain that you will see all this as just a bunch of words, designed to make me "sound soo brite"... and I do have the conviction of my words, as you seem to have the conviction of yours. I would be happier if you could argue your position more effectively, based not on contradictions, statements that when followed to their natural conclusion tacitly deny the right of other faiths to exist, and which ultimately rely on the argument that just because everyone else seems to be doing something, it then follows that I should... None of these things argues for your position strongly. The argument is a circular one at best, and at worst, amounts to saying, "you should because I say so," which has never worked well for me. By all means, I welcomed a well-reasoned discussion - one in which you, perhaps, share why Islam IS the one true faith for you... what in the Q'ran makes it so for you?... I am not one to look at a religious text and simply say, "okay."... Which is why I don't practice Judaism, though I can argue well that it has its strong points and give examples of what they are, for me. What is it that makes you cleave to Islam with such conviction? I am truly curious... respectfully...

I am not asking you to defend your faith. That is asking that one logically argue for faith and it has been shown repeatedly that logical proofs for the existence of God - cosmological or ontological - and therefore faith in God, ultimately fail... I believe, though some may disagree, that when it comes down to it, Hegel and Kant were derivative enough to cover just about everything, and I believe that logically, Hegel failed on both counts... But then if I am to be scientific-minded, and therefore, one would hope, logical, and in an infinite universe, logically, one can never disprove the existence of anything... then I'm not asking for a logical argument... I'm asking why Islam and the Q'ran are meaningful to you to the point where you believe that Islam is the one true faith. Respectfully. Not to defend your faith... I am trying, open-mindedly, to understand the 'why' of your faith, because I am honestly interested... and not in numbers... you aren't faithful to Islam because it is the fastest growing religion in the world... that's just a bad argument for why others should submit to it... So, why do you submit to it?...

Others here might say that I'm asking too much, or that I'm inviting further derision towards us, or pointless argument... I don't think so. I think that you believe strongly in something that is important to you, and so I'm inviting you to explain to me why it is so important to you - that may go much further in, at the very least, helping me to understand your point of view, and I will approach what you say open-mindedly if you speak from your heart about your faith, rather than tell me what to do, but not really why. Numbers don't tell me anything about your beliefs, and why they are important to you and what you feel. That will speak much more loudly for your faith than argument that talks around faith but not of it.

I can be honest and tell you what others here know about me - that I struggle a great deal with the idea of faith, and submission. I have friends who have a deep faith in their respective religions, and I envy them because I know that it brings them comfort and solace, as well as strength. I have trouble with the idea that I should submit to the will of a God, be it YHWH or Jehovah or Allah, based on notions of reward and punishment for 'right' and 'wrong' behaviour respectively, as that seems to me to be acting not out of a true belief in right and wrong, but out of fear or for reward, as a child would, and to me, that does not address morality. I understand the role that 'free will' plays in various religions, but free will tied to reward or punishment still renders choice inauthentic for me. Also, as a woman, I am stuck with the fact that almost all religions, when practised orthodoxly, for all intents and purposes, mark me as a 'second class citizen', be it Judaism, Christianity, or Islam. I have less rights and freedoms than men do, and in many instances, not only am I not allowed to study my religion 'of choice' as an equal with men, but I am no better than a brood mare, who must submit to the will of God by submitting to the will of my husband (or father, or brothers, or even male strangers). Religious law is applied to me differently, often more stringently, and always by men, and as this inequality is doctrinal, unless I practice a watered-down version of any religion or accept the idea that as a woman I am fulfilling my role within my respective religion by, again, submitting to being less than I would be as a man, then I am left with no answer to the fact of this inequality. So, as you can see, this is not something that I don't think about, and in fact, it is something that I do struggle with. I try to approach it with an open mind, whether that is apparent to you or not, but I respond better to people explaining why scripture or doctrine is important to them and it's meaning for them, better than I respond to people telling me simply that I should believe something. But that requires that you be honest and therefore vulnerable, just as I have been by explaining my position. This isn't political satire or joking, but an honest request... not even politics, period, and so a bit off topic, but it's a question... a request I pose not infrequently, though I rarely get an answer. If you answer thoughtfully and honestly, though some may disagree with you, I don't believe they will disrespect or criticize you unless you disrespect or criticize them.

Sister Massively Interested

User avatar
Red Square wrote:First the Mime, now the Shorthand Guy.

Reading Zak is like watching someone riding a unicycle in large polka-dot trousers while demanding to be taken seriously.

Or a spoiled punk kid with pierced lips and limited vocabulary demanding respect while not showing any to the other side.

Or the stuttering lisping lawyer in My Cousin Vinnie who was trying to convince the jury by making them want to get it over with so that they don't have to listen to him again and play the unnerving guessing game trying to figure out what he was really trying to say.

Commissar Theocritus wrote:Could Zak be a troll? There is something of the same sort of whining, self-justifying "it's all about me" self-centeredness that we find in the Mime and in the whining wussy Jodin.

Well... Troll or not, Shorthand-guy or not, polka-dot trousers or not (what do you have against pierced lips?) I decided to respond seriously and request a serious response. I hope I get one. You know me... I'm always interested in other points of view, if they are well reasoned and honest. I can only ask, even if the answer isn't funny... but like I said in my post to him, I often request, but rarely get a response... or at least a meaningful one. I know I'm an innocent for wearing my eternal optimism toward my fellow humans on my sleeve, especially as I'm often in tank-tops, and so as often as not, my eternal optimism is painful, but one day I might end up with a really nice tattoo...

Que Sera Sera
Sister Doris Day

mona
since you cant tolerate any ill spoken about your country (USA), that is fucking the entire world, with its huge bubble of illusion. you have no right to condemn anyone's religion!

Its amazing how ignorant you guys are…

Make me want to laugh at your pretensions!


and btw...the people in the stoning video and the girl are Yazids not Muslims. please get your facts straights and research right before posting. Also, get out of your shell and learn a bit about Islam, then write, instead of finding out wrong translations of your interest, from website created by people like you, who mislead.

ZAK
chill out mona...
Point taken tho.. Read my next post..
slmz

ZAK
To my Massively Interested Sister (and everyone else), I hope my reply addresses your curiosities.
(I tried my best to make sure my grammar is acceptable)
I'm truly sorry if I offended you with the closed bottle example. I was just saying in general, that 1 cannot explain a point to a person, if they aren't willing to listen.

The word ISLAM has a two-fold meaning: peace, and submission to God. This submission requires a fully conscious and willing effort to submit to the one Almighty God. One must consciously and conscientiously give oneself to the service of Allah. This means to act on what Allah enjoins all of us to do (in the Qur'an) and what His beloved Prophet, Muhammad (pbuh) encouraged us to do in his Sunnah (his lifestyle and sayings personifying the Qur'an).

Once we humble ourselves, rid ourselves of our egoism and submit totally to Allah, and to Him exclusively, in faith and in action, we will surely feel peace in our hearts. Establishing peace in our hearts will bring about peace in our external conduct as well.


Misconception: Muslims are violent, terrorists, and extremists!

This is the biggest misconception in Islam, no doubt resulting from the constant stereotyping and bashing the media gives Islam. When a gunman attacks a mosque in the name of Judaism, or a Catholic IRA guerrilla sets off a bomb in an urban area, or Serbian Orthodox militiamen rape and kill innocent Muslim civilians, these acts are not used to stereotype and bash an entire faith. Never are these acts attributed to the religious teachings of the perpetrators. Yet how many times have we heard the words 'Islamist or Muslim fundamentalist' linked with violence.

Politics in so-called “Muslim countries" may or may not have any Islamic basis. Often dictators and politicians will use the name of Islam for their own purposes. One should remember to go to the source of Islam and separate what the true religion of Islam says from what is portrayed in the media. Islam literally means 'submission to God' and is derived from a root word meaning 'peace'.

Islam may seem exotic or even extreme in the modern world. Perhaps this is because religion doesn't dominate everyday life in the West, whereas Islam is considered a 'way of life' for Muslims and they make no division between secular and sacred in their lives. Like Christianity, Islam permits fighting in self-defense, in defense of religion, or on the part of those who have been expelled forcibly from their homes. It lays down strict rules of combat which include prohibitions against harming civilians and against destroying crops, trees and livestock.

No where does Islam or the Qur'an enjoin the killing of innocents. The Qur'an says: "Fight in the cause of God against those who fight you, but do not transgress limits. God does not love transgressors." (Qur'an Chapter 2: Verse 190) And also, "If they seek peace, then seek you peace. And trust in God for He is the One that heareth and knoweth all things." (Qur'an, Chapter 8: Verse 61). War, therefore, is a last resort, and is subject to the rigorous conditions laid down by the sacred law. The term 'jihad' literally means 'struggle'. Muslims believe that there are two kinds of jihad. The other 'jihad' is the inner struggle of the soul which everyone wages against egotistic desires for the sake of attaining inner peace.

Misconception: Islam oppresses women.

The image of the typical Muslim woman wearing the veil and forced to stay home and forbidden to drive is all too common in most peoples' thoughts. Although some Muslim countries may have laws that oppress women, this should not be seen as coming from Islam. Many of these countries do not rule by any true Shari'ah(Islamic law), and instead introduce their own cultural standpoints on the issue of gender equity.

Islam gives men and women different roles, and equity between the two is laid down in the Qur'an and the example of the Prophet (peace be upon him). Islam sees a woman, whether single or married, as an individual in her own right, with the right to own and dispose of her property and earnings. A marriage gift is given by the groom to the bride for her own personal use, and she can keep her own family name rather than taking her husband's. Both men and women are expected to dress in a way which is modest and dignified. The Messenger of God (peace be upon him) said: "The most perfect in faith amongst believers is he who is best in manner and kindest to his wife."

Violence of any kind towards women and forcing them against their will for anything is not allowed. A Muslim marriage is a simple, legal agreement in which either partner is free to include conditions. Marriage customs thus vary widely from country to country. Divorce is not common, although it is acceptable as a last resort. According to Islamic teachings, a Muslim girl cannot be forced to marry against her will.

Misconception: Muslims worship a different God

Allah is simply the Arabic word for God. Allah for Muslims is the greatest and most inclusive of the Names of God, it is an Arabic word of rich meaning, denoting the one and only God and ascribing no partners to Him. It is exactly the same word which the Jews, in Hebrew, use for God (eloh), the word which Jesus Christ used in Aramaic when he prayed to God. God has an identical name in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam; Allah is the same God worshiped by Muslims, Christians and Jews. Muslims believe that Allah's sovereignty is to be acknowledged in worship and in the pledge to obey His teaching and commandments, conveyed through His messengers and prophets who were sent at various times and in many places throughout history.

Misconception: Islam was spread by the sword and is intolerant of other faiths

Many social studies textbooks for students show the image of an Arab horseman carrying a sword in one hand and the Qur'an in the other, conquering and forcibly converting. This, though, is not a correct portrayal of history. Islam has always given respect and freedom of religion to all faiths. The Qur'an says: "God forbids you not, with regards to those who fight you not for [your] faith nor drive you out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them; for God loveth those who are just." (Qur'an, Chapter 60: Verse 8) Freedom of religion is laid down in the Qur'an itself: "There is no compulsion (or coercion) in the religion (Islam). The right direction is distinctly clear from error". (Qur'an, Chapter 2: Verse 256)

Christian missionary, T.W. Arnold had this opinion on his study of the question of the spread of Islam: "Of any organized attempt to force the acceptance of Islam on the non-Muslim population, or of any systematic persecution intended to stamp out the Christian religion, we hear nothing. Had the caliphs chosen to adopt either course of action, they might have swept away Christianity as easily as Ferdinand and Isabella drove Islam out of Spain, or Louis XIV made Protestantism."

It is a function of Islamic law to protect the privileged status of minorities, and this is why non-Muslim places of worship have flourished all over the Islamic world. History provides many examples of Muslim tolerance towards other faiths: when the caliph Omar entered Jerusalem in the year 634AD, Islam granted freedom of worship to all religious communities in the city. Proclaiming to the inhabitants that their lives, and property were safe, and that their places of worship would never be taken from them, he asked the Christian patriarch Sophronius to accompany him on a visit to all the holy places.

Islamic law also permits non-Muslim minorities to set up their own courts, which implement family laws drawn up by the minorities themselves. The life and property of all citizens in an Islamic state are considered sacred whether the person is Muslim or not.

Racism is not a part of Islam, the Qur'an speaks only of human equality and how all peoples are equal in the sight of God. "O mankind! We created you from a single soul, male and female, and made you into nations and tribes, so that you may come to know one another. Truly, the most honored of you in God's sight is the greatest of you in piety. God is All-Knowing, All- Aware." (Qur'an, Chapter 49: Verse 13)

Misconceptions: All Muslims are Arabs

The Muslim population of the world is around 1.4 billion. 1 out of 4 people in the world is a Muslim. Muslims come from a vast range of races, nationalities and cultures from around the globe -from the Philippines to Nigeria- they are united by their common Islamic faith. Only about 18% of Muslims live in the Arab world. The largest Muslim community is in Indonesia. Most Muslims live east of Pakistan. 30 percent of Muslims live in the Indian subcontinent, 20 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa, 17 percent in Southeast Asia, 18 percent in the Arab world and 10 percent in the Soviet Union and China. Turkey, Iran and Afghanistan make up 10 percent of the non-Arab Middle East. Although there are Muslim minorities in almost every area, including Latin America and Australia, they are most numerous in Russia and its newly independent states, India and central Africa. There are about 8 million Muslims in the United States

Misconception: The Nation of Islam is a Muslim group

Islam and the so-called “Nation of Islam" are two different religions. Muslims consider this group to be just one of many cults using the name of Islam for their own gain.

Islam and the Nation of Islam differ in many fundamental ways. All Muslims must believe that there is only one God worthy of worship and that Muhammad PBUH was the last messenger of God, but Nation of Islam teaches something totally different. Also, Nation of Islam followers believe in racism and that the 'black man' was the original man and therefore superior, while in Islam there is no racism and everyone is considered equal in the sight of God, the only difference being in one's piety. There are many other theological examples that show the Nation's teachings have little to do with true Islam.

Any serious student of Islam has a duty to investigate and find the true Islam. The only two authentic sources which bind every Muslim are The Quran and Authentic hadith(sayings of the prophet). Any teachings under the label of "Islam" which contradict or are at variance with the direct understanding of fundamental beliefs and practices of Islam form the Quran and authentic hadith should be rejected and such a religion should be considered a Pseudo-Islamic Cult. In America there are many pseudo-Islamic cults, Nation of Islam being one of them. An honest attitude on the part of such cults should be not to call themselves Muslims and their religion Islam. Such an example of honesty is Bahaism which is an off-shoot of Islam but Bahais do not call themselves Muslims nor their religion, Islam. In fact Bahaism is not Islam just as Nation of Islam is not Islam.

Misconception: All Muslim men marry four wives

The religion of Islam was revealed for all societies and all times and so it accommodates widely differing social requirements. Circumstances may warrant the taking of another wife, but the right is granted, according to the Qur'an only on condition that the husband is scrupulously fair. No woman can be forced into this kind of marriage if they do not wish it.

Polygamy is neither mandatory, nor encouraged, but merely permitted. Images of "sheikhs with harems" are not consistent with Islam, as a man is only allowed at most four wives only if he can fulfill the stringent conditions of treating each fairly and providing each with separate housing etc. Permission to practice polygamy is not associated with mere satisfaction of passion. It is rather associated with compassion toward widows and orphans. It was the Qur'an that limited and put conditions on the practice of polygamy among the Arabs, who had as many as ten or more wives and considered them "property". It is both honest and accurate to say that it is Islam which regulated this practice, limited it, made it more humane and instituted equal rights and status for all wives. What the Qur'anic decrees amount to, taken together is discouragement of polygamy unless necessity for it exists. It is also evident that the general trend in Islam is monogamy and not polygamy. It is a very small percentage of Muslims that practice polygamy over the world. However, permission to practice limited polygamy is only consistent with Islam's realistic view of the nature of man and woman and of various social needs, problems and cultural variations. It also is the frank and straightforward approach of Islam in dealing with practical problems. Rather than requiring hypocritical and superficial compliance, Islam delves deeper into the problems of individuals and societies, and provides for legitimate and clean solutions which are far more beneficial than would be the case if they were ignored. There is no doubt that the second wife legally married and treated kindly is better off than a mistress without any legal rights or expermanence.

Misconceptions: Muslims are a barbaric, backwards people

Among the reasons for the rapid and peaceful spread of Islam was the simplicity of its doctrine -Islam calls for faith in only one God worthy of worship. It also repeatedly instructs man to use his powers of intelligence and observation. Within a few years of the spread of Islam, great civilizations and universities were flourishing, for according to the Prophet (pbuh), 'seeking knowledge is an obligation for every Muslim man and woman'.

The synthesis of Eastern and Western ideas and of new thought with old, brought about great advances in medicine, mathematics, physics, astronomy, geography, architecture, art, literature and history. Many crucial systems such as algebra, the Arabic numerals, and also the concept of the zero (vital to the advancement of mathematics), were transmitted to medieval Europe from Islam. Sophisticated instruments were developed which were to make possible the European voyages of discovery, including the astrolabe, the quadrant and good navigational maps.

Misconceptions: Muhammad was the founder of Islam and Muslims worship him

Muslims only worshio the one true God and believe that Muhammad (peace be upon him) was the last messenger sent by God to the world. Muhammad PBUH was a most noble man and beloved prophet, yet Muslims certainly donot worship him, or any other created being.

Muhammad PBUH was born in Mecca in the year 570. Since his father died before his birth and his mother shortly afterwards, he was raised by his uncle from the respected tribe of Quraysh. As he grew up, he became known for his truthfulness, generosity and sincerity, so that he was sought after for his ability to arbitrate in disputes. The historians describe him as calm and meditative. Muhammad PBUHwas of a deeply religious nature, and had long detested the decadence of his society.

It became his habit to meditate from time to time in the Cave of Hira near Mecca. At the age of 40, while engaged in a meditative retreat, Muhammad PBUH received his first revelation from God, through the Angel Gabriel. This revelation, which continued for 23 years, is known as the Qur'an. As soon as he began to recite the words he heard from Gabriel and to preach the truth which God had revealed to him, he and his small group of followers suffered bitter persecution, which grew so fierce that in the year 622 God gave them the command to emigrate.

This event, the Hijra 'migration', in which they left Mecca for the city of Medina, marks the beginning of the Muslim calendar. After several years, the Prophet and his followers were able to return to Mecca, where they forgave their enemies and established Islam definitively. Before the Prophet PBUHdied at the age of 63, the greater part of Arabia was Muslim, and within a century of his death Islam had spread to Spain in the West and as far East as China.

While Muhammad PBUH was chosen to deliver the message, he is not considered the "founder" of Islam, since Muslims consider Islam to be the same divine guidance sent to all prophets before. Muslims believe all the prophets from Adam, Noah, Moses, Jesus etc. were all sent with the same divine guidance for their peoples. Since all prophets came from the same God, they all brought the same basic message -calling their people to the worship of one God. Every prophet was sent to his own people, but Muhammad PBUH was sent to all of mankind. Muhammad PBUH is the last and final messenger sent to deliver the message of Islam. Muslims love and honor him, but they do not worship him. In the Qur'an, it says: "O Prophet, verily We have sent you as a witness and a bearer of glad tidings and a warner and as one who invites unto God by His leave and as an illuminating lamp." (Qur'an, Chapter 33: Verses 45-6)

Misconception: Muslims don't believe in Jesus or any other prophets

Muslims respect and love Jesus, upon him be peace, and await his Second Coming. They consider him a great messenger from God to mankind. A Muslim never refers to him simply as 'Jesus', but always adds the phrase 'upon him be peace' (abbreviated as (u) here). The Qur'an confirms his virgin birth (a chapter of the Quran is entitled 'Mary'), and Mary is considered amongst the best and most noble women. The Qur'an describes the Annunciation as follows: "Behold!" the Angel said, "God has chosen you, and purified you, and chosen you above the women of all nations. O Mary, God gives you good news of a word from Him whose name shall be the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, honored in this world and the Hereafter, and one of those brought near to God. He shall speak to the people from his cradle and in maturity, and shall be of the righteous." She said: "O my Lord! How shall I have a son when no man has touched me?" He said: "Even so; God creates what He will. When He decrees a thing, He says to it, "Be!" and it is" (Qur'an, Chapter 3: Verses 42-47)

Jesus (uhbp) was born miraculously through the same power which had brought Adam (u) into being without a father: "Truly, the likeness of Jesus with God is as the likeness of Adam. He created him of dust, and then said to him, 'Be!' and he was." (Qur'an, Chapter 3: Verses 59) During his prophetic mission Jesus (uhbp) performed many miracles. The Quran tells us that he said: "I have come to you with a sign from your Lord: I make for you out of clay, as it were, the figure of a bird, and breathe into it and it becomes a bird by God's leave. And I heal the blind, and the lepers, and I raise the dead by God's leave." (Qur'an, Chapter 3: Verses 49) Neither Muhammad (pbuh) not Jesus (uhbp) came to change the basic doctrine of the belief in One God brought by earlier prophets, but instead to confirm and renew it.

In the Qur'an Jesus (uhbp) is reported as saying that he came: "To attest the law which was before me. And to make lawful to you part of what was forbidden you; I have come to you with a sign from your Lord, so fear God and obey Me. (Qur'an, Chapter 3: Verses 50) The Prophet Muhammad(pbuh) said: "Whoever believes there is no god but God, alone without partner, that Muhammad(pbuh) is His messenger, that Jesus is the servant and messenger of God, His word breathed into Mary and a spirit emanating from Him, and that Paradise and Hell are true, shall be received by God into Heaven. "(Hadith related by Bukhari)

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ZAK wrote:chill out mona...
Point taken tho.. Read my next post..
slmz

Hey Mona - Commissarka Pinkie has a shiny shovel for you my dear!

ZAK- Is it in book form? Talk about a diarrhea mouth!
Commissar Theocritis- I believe you may be right about ZAK, our "newest troll" lol

SMO- You are indeed on the People's opiates. They make you communicate with such conviction and persuasion.

servant of the People,

Che Gourmet

"enca bronadao y dolente"

PS Commissarka Pinkie- If you should need help........nah...no help need to crush these infidels!!!

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Zak, Its great that you are able to copy and paste the words of Huma Ahmad, we progressive liberals are masters at copying and pasting and I salute your efforts. However, do you have any intelligent thoughts that are truly your own?

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Comrade,

Maybe ZAK is secret code name for Huma Ahmad.

Or perhaps she plagiarized Zak's own words first.

Would you believe, maybe...that...er...they both had the exact same words given to them at the same time...ah...by....

Never mind; you are wise, Comrade.

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ZAK wrote:Misconception: Muslims are violent, terrorists, and extremists!

This is the biggest misconception in Islam, no doubt resulting from the constant stereotyping and bashing the media gives Islam. When a gunman attacks a mosque in the name of Judaism, or a Catholic IRA guerrilla sets off a bomb in an urban area, or Serbian Orthodox militiamen rape and kill innocent Muslim civilians, these acts are not used to stereotype and bash an entire faith. Never are these acts attributed to the religious teachings of the perpetrators. Yet how many times have we heard the words 'Islamist or Muslim fundamentalist' linked with violence.

Okay, first the Jew who attacked the mosque was doing that because he was sick of the Muslims suicide bombing and shooting rockets at his country and he snapped. That's understandable. Second, the IRA is a Communist/Marxist terrorist group, who's actions has very little to do with actual Catholicism and are more motivated by political ideas. They don't do the things they do in the name of Jesus or god, and if you notice, their actions were never encouraged by the Catholic Church.

Lastly, the Serbs were defending themselves from the Islamic Albanian drug smugglers who were killing anyone who resisted their efforts. The Albanians used the drug money to fund terrorist groups who proceeded to kill in the name of Islam. Their actions were nothing more than what was done to them by the Islamic drug cartels.

The reason the actions of these groups are never associated with their religion is because their religion isn't the motivator of their actions unlike Islam. These people don't kill in the name of Jesus and God and then go on worldwide television and brag about it to everyone out there.

Islam is a flawed religion that has nothing to do with God. It was created by a selfish, drug addled child molester so he could live a life of perversion and be crowned a hero for all those who blindly followed him because his religion promised things that they wanted.

ZAK
This isn't an an assignment im handing in for marks..haha, talking about plagiarism..It's called collaborating..and its wholesome information.. I doubt whether your'l even read the article.. alas, like I said, all the oceans of the world cant fill a bottle if its sealed.

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ZAK wrote:This isn't an an assignment im handing in for marks..haha, talking about plagiarism..It's called collaborating..and its wholesome information.. I doubt whether your'l even read the article.. alas, like I said, all the oceans of the world cant fill a bottle if its sealed.

So, in your argument you are right and we are wrong and will remain wrong until we accept what you say.
You imply this by your statement "all the oceans of the world can't fill a bottle if it's sealed."

Even in the face of all the evidence presented to you contradicting your arguments as baseless, you still stand firm that you are right and we are wrong.

Does not your own statement of bottles and oceans apply to you?

Are you not the closed bottle who will not be filled by the ocean of truth that Islam is a religion of violence and hate?

ISTANBUL, October 14, (Compass Direct News) – Taliban militants bombed a Catholic-run girls' school in Pakistan's war-torn Swat Valley as part of a larger effort to subvert women's status in society through Islamic law, locals say.
On Wednesday (Oct. 8 ) the Islamic terrorist group bombed the Convent Girls' School in Sangota, run by the Presentation Sisters,a Catholic religious order that has opened girls' schools around the world. Militants have threatened the school frequently for offering education to females.

Tolerant of women? Or tolerant of women who know their place and live only to serve men?

"Al-Qaeda' terrorists who brainwashed Exeter suicide bomber still on the run," by Duncan Gardham for the Telegraph
October 15:The al-Qaeda extremists who brainwashed an autistic Muslim convert into launching a failed suicide nail bomb attack in a family restaurant are still on the run, it can be disclosed.

Tolerant of the handicapped? Or tolerant of the handicapped so long as they are useful tools of murder?

...a manual of Islamic law certified by Al-Azhar as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However,"not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2).

Tolerant of children? Or tolerant of children as long as they are good little Jihadists?

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The number of Christian families who have fled the northern Iraqi city of Mosul in the past week has reached 1,350, authorities said Wednesday.
Nineveh Deputy Governor Khasro Goran said the new numbers were provided by the provincial city's office of immigration and displaced persons.
The families fled, reportedly frightened by a series of killings and threats by Muslim extremists ordering them to convert to Islam or face possible death, Iraqi officials said.<br>Fourteen Christians have been slain in the past two weeks in the city, which is located about 260 miles (420 kilometers) north of Baghdad.

Allowed to practice any religion? Or allowed to practice any religion as long as it is Islam?

Fringe element you say.
Crackpots you say.
Not mainstream Islam you say.

Then I say where are the mainstream Islam outcries? Where are the Muslims marching in the streets of New York denouncing these 'crackpots' as not true followers of Islam? Where is Muslims United in Support of America?

I do not see these people because they do not exist.

Do not get me wrong, I know that there are Muslims who think that these whackos are just that...whackos.

But unfortunately from what I have seen and heard they are the minority.

O'Brien

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Mona, you demonstrate, again, the insularity of Islam. Sister very eloquently suggested that <i>you</i> pull your head out of your ass. I am on the other hand a bit more direct. And I was in a this post before editing it for being too direct.

Zak, to your cut-and-paste job, addressing things which were not addressed before.

I know all I need to know about Islam. I have read about the fire in the girls' school in Saudi Arabia, and the religious police threw the girls back into the fire, to be burned, because they were not dressed. I know that in Afghanistan a doctor could not attend to a patient giving birth or with gynecological problems, but had to call instructions through a keyhole. A lot of women died. A woman gets raped, and her sister is gang-raped in revenge. In no way can you say that Islam is not the most brutally anti-women religion left on earth.

I am gay, and you want a wall to fall on me. Pretty hard on your relatives and friends, and don't say you don't have gays. Every culture does. But in America we live. Topeka, KS has the odious Fred Phelps, and Kansas has no use for gays, but they stand entirely behind our right to exist, against Fred Phelps. I wouldn't set up a bar there (or anywhere), but I would feel safe in Kansas from the threat of dying. Not so in Egypt, where gays are routinely imprisoned. Or in Saudi Arabia, where gays are executed.

I have done reading, and am doing reading. I read over and over about good Muslims who talk about the perfect freedom in Allah--this is not freedom as a lot of people would understand it. It's a fundamentalist freedom, shared by some fundamentalist Christians, by the fundamentalist left (all that talking about freedom as the concentration camps are being set up), and it's even the talk about freedom in SM relationships.

It's the freedom of refusing to think, to make a judgment, to trust to something else to make your judgments for you.

I know that Muslims think that the Koran has everything that you need to know; I knew a man in my background who thought that the Bible did too. But he didn't mind open-heart surgery.

Fundamentalism believes that there was a perfect time--the time of the Prophet, of Jesus, or in the case of Rousseau, before civilization, when things were perfect and every generation gets worse. And so the present world must be torn down. To make room for the perfect state. This was the genesis of Pakistan, which is a remittance economy, existing on the money that people send back home. It is a failed state, as are all fundamentalist states. The Soviet Union was a failed state.

Five hundred years ago, or actually 516 years ago, in Spain, Isabella turned loose Torquemada who drove out the only tolerant people in the area: the Muslim Moors. But since that time the Muslims have started murdering people for not being Muslim--don't even go there--whereas the Christians have in general stopped. The religious left is still trying.

All of this is for the perfect world. Which will be brought about by the Inquisition, the Soviet death camps, or 9/11. All done by people who run from making their own decisions, who have placed the responsibility for their lives in something which promises to end their uncertainty.

Every single one of these people has done away with the first essential responsibility of being a human being: making personal judgments.

Since the reformation the Christians have quit killing people, in general. The Jews had their own Reformation. The Japanese have managed to make use of the Western enlightenment to leapfrog a lot of their fundamentalist ways.

We're still waiting for Islam.

And by the way, "fucking over the world"? Let's see. Fighting Hitler, Stalin, and <i>going home</i>. Building schools and infrastructures in countries which we invaded to purge them of evil governments, and <i>then going home</i>. This is fucking people over?

I am asking you to do what is impossible: to step outside the structure of your religion and look at the here and now. What exists here? What exists now? If you spend your life waiting for something which you cannot prove, aren't you living second-hand? Do you actually exist?

If we were as evil as you say we were, you'd be very polite because we'd kill you if you weren't. Killing civilized people is the act of a sniveling coward who cannot face up to the failure of his religion to provide the western accomplishments which he wants, doesn't mind using, but cannot invent, or repair.

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Zak,
Thank you for your serious answer, despite Mr. Gourmet's and others responses..... he seems not to understand that I asked for a long, or at least, serious, answer. It's not quite what I'd hoped for, as it still doesn't address what all these things mean to you... why you feel it is important to submit and what resonates with you... Also, though there are points you make that I wouldn't argue with, there are others I would respond to because I believe they are somewhat oversimplified... the points you make about some misconceptions aren't something I'm concerned about per se, as I have Muslim friends who aren't Arab and don't have four wives, etc.... I'm not concerned about stereotypes particularly... And I'll do my best to address the points I believer are over simplifications in the not to distant future... I'd do it today but I've got a bitch of a cold that even WealthSpread™ can't seem to do anything for, so I'm a bit fuzzy-headed and really not up to sitting here for too long...

Mr. Che Gourmet... Please don't attack ZAK for posting something I asked him to post... his post was no longer than mine (actually... it's pretty hard to post anything longer than my posts, except perhaps, the entire Communist Manifesto... or Mein Kampf, as the Mime might assert) and while many here would not agree with him, I requested a serious answer from him, even if it's one I disagree with in whole, or in part... that's not being a troll... he respectfully responded to a request on my part, and did so politely... for which I thank him.

Perhaps I'll take my discussion with him to Private Messaging, as although we don't agree on everything, he was responding to a request from me and I don't think he should be attacked for that... but if the discussion offends, and this thread is probably not the right place for it, I'll take it elsewhere.

Anyway - Zak - thank you for the serious answer... when I'm feeling a little better I'll PM you.

Best
SMO

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"Truth is elusive to those who refuse to see with both eyes."
-T3h Ori

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Comrade SMO

I respectfully back off. You are right ([HIGHLIGHT=#ffff00]always[/HIGHLIGHT]). I was being a little protective and should have known that you could handle ZAK in your own gracious way. Many pardons, please? I'm just a little caught up in the People's Revolution, since it's progressing so nicely. I'm kind of used to failing (you know, Bolivia) and I don't want to make any more mistakes. Please do not hesitate to ask if you need any help though, because I will sacrifice [HIGHLIGHT=#ff0000]ALL[/HIGHLIGHT] for the Party's Leaders and the Progressive Revolution of Next Tuesday!

submissively your servant,

Che' Gourmet
VIVA LA REVOLUTION!
POWER TO THE PARTY! Image

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Comrade Gourmet,

De Nada, as my Argentine SO would say.... he is, of course, soooooooo very proud of his shared Guevarian heritage... really.... he told me so right after his last promotion to Plant Comptroller which he celebrated by firing at 30% of the line workers... I'm sorry... did I say firing AT?... I meant laid off (to the side... in bags... for a little while)...

Anyhow... I'm still down with this bug, so not quite on top of things and feeling like a bag of crap, but will be back shortly, I hope... and will try and communicate what I'm looking for from ZAK a little better, if possible... I'd like less Agitprop and more feeeeeeelings... his bottom line and not 'the party line' as it were...

Plodding through the Poppies
Sister Massively Opiated

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Get better, sister. It's hard to clean my house without your inspiration.

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Only a couple more days, my dear Comrade Theocritus, and I will change the bag in my Miele vacuum cleaner and transcribe its love letter to your Hildo (the KitchenAid stand mixer has been strangely mute, though staring at me dolefully whenever I'm at the apartment, but it may just be that it's angry with me for being away so long, or jealous that the Miele's been used a great deal in preparation for my return, and the mixer hasn't yet... you know how I love to bake)... that, and I'll have Svjetlana, the Ukrainian wonder, give Bruno a call and whip him into shape... when she gets going in her authoritative tone, spewing Ukrainian faster than I can make sense of it, I can only describe it as both frightening, and inspirational at the same time... I can't help but go and inventory my cleaning products (I assume, by default, that if she's wailing away at me in her native tongue and at a certain volume, that I've run out of BAM kitchen degreaser... that or orange Vim - her favourite)... I feel certain that she will have the same effect on Bruno, spooking him like a recalcitrant gelding, looking at a bottle of Elmer's... All his possible futures (or lack thereof) will flash before his eyes and he'll choose the lamé thong and five inch red stilettos rather than be permanently put out to pasture... Your place'll be shining in no time...

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Yes, dear Sister, that is a good deal. But I had to get rid of the five-inch red stilettos that he has. I admit that they were quieter than the Carmen Miranda platform shoes--think Herman Munster--but with all that weight? I have, in bad times, rented him out as a thug, but only if he doesn't open his mouth. That breaks the illusion.

All that beef, and those wide shoulders, make him look like an acorn squash on a compass and he pokes holes in the tiles.

And the cost. Did you know that I had to have the heels made out of carbon fiber? That was the reason that America lost the America's cup--they didn't have time to make a carbon-fiber mast and Dennis Conner is <i>mightily</i> pissed and for a while took to walking around with Restoration Hardware catalog for bait and a cordite harpoon for punishment.

I was afraid but I've found that very dim people can't understand what you are saying but can understand the tone of your voice. So I've learned that if I speak to Bruno in a certain way, he'll whimper and rub his nose in a pile of rhinestones, promising never to use my credit card again.

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it's pretty hard to post anything longer than my posts, except perhaps, the entire Communist Manifesto...

Perish the thought! The CM is actually quite short.

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Betinov, I am so impressed that you're so current with the CM. I have tattooed it on Bruno's back, of course. But I consider it a sine qua non for a party member.

Comerades....we in the politburo are at odds with our Muslim friends. It seems that we are happy to use them when they are anti-western but we remember their hostility to our glorious military when we tried to free Aghanistan. We laud the actions of our comerade in arms, Am-a-nutjob of Iran, but we are going to eventually get even with the mujahadeen who killed many of our socialist warriors. The fact that the socialist inspired cube is close to the shape of the Khaba is unfourtunate but we want to remind our socialist minded Muslims that they do not own the patent on cubes. In fact, Ivan Kikindacrotch of Putz, Russia was the first human to invent the cube. It is Mohammed who copied it from us. So there. Again...gloriously we communist have proven the righteousness of our cause.

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Oh, hell, kill them all and let Lenin sort them out.


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It saves wear and tear on the cerebellum, which is in short supply after a visit to JiffiLobo, Where Good Party Members Go™.


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It's an adjunct to JiffyLube. You drive in and are given a Valium and a double shot of Putinka vodka. Lie back in a comfy chair, and a party-approved lobotomist lifts back your right eyelid and sticks a very sharp scalpel up into the prefrontal lobs and pokes around a bit.

And in 15 minutes you no longer are capable of Thoughtcrime™. You will be very happy and content with your shovel and a Beet of the Week award will be a star on your refrigerator.

Pravda, I'm recommending JiffyLobo to all the troublesome people who might have doubts.

Then you can watch a Michael Moore movie and realize its essential truth. Oliver Stone? God's own truth. Anything that Nansky Peloski says? Of course she's right. She's Nansky.

We cannot have Thoughtcrime™ for it's just not on. So get yourself to JiffiLobo today.

Then you can become march with Code Pink or become a professor at Berkley or Duke.

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Here's wishing a MERRY CHRISTMAS to all of our Islamist um, er...friends! (won't they be suprised...NO VIRGINS, just DONKEYS!).

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Eeewwww....

Actually, they might prefer it that way.

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Tolerant people my ass. Hey islam, take it from me, people have their own opinions, they shape it by many things, you can't force your beliefs onto them. As such, leave us alone with your beliefs, and we'll leave you alone, but we both know you won't leave us alone.

Such irony is disgusting.

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Elliott, the point of fundamentalism is that at one time--say the time of the Prophet--the world was perfect, and it has gone downhill since. So it must be destroyed and rebuilt to be perfect again. Some fundamentalists say that even includes things like modern medicine, until of course they get quite sick and by then it's too late.

Well, I consider that natural selection.

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Many would argue that Commissar, and there are valid points to be made from it. If you were to ask me, I suppose there is such thing as the "perfect point", look at the Garden of Eden before and after, heck, let's small scale it, look at any disaster before, after a short time, and after a long time.

Natural selection does come with its share of irony.

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I don't believe in a perfect point--which is not to say that some times are not better or worse than others. I'm 53. A conceit we played in our 30s was what we could do if we were 19 knowing what we (thought we) knew then. What fun we could have.

Rubbish. I'm a different man now. A Roman general said you never bathe in the same river twice. I never read the same book twice. People think that Utopia is Eutopia, which would be Good. But Thomas Moore really started it, I believe, as nutopia--no place.

There seems to be something self-denying in so much yearning for another time and another place. We're here, and we have to get used to it.

If I could change myself and look like the 1982 Tom Selleck, would I do so? Silly to dream of it really, to take the time.

Perhaps that explains why I don't think I'll ever write a novel.

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I was meaning a high point by the "perfect point". You are right though, because we aren't perfect, there is no perfect point, there was no perfect point, and there will not be a perfect point.

I no longer have any desire or wanting to have the ability of time travel, too many things I'd rather not relive, revise or even remember. So it's no surprise I burn most of my memories in the memory hole, that and I think age is getting to me. . .

I wish I could remember that Roman general's name, but there is truth to his statement.

I've found it so annoying when people want to return to a time. Even if you could, would it be worth it, even if you could change it, would the grandfather paradoxplay any significance?

Such questions I don't care if I have answered, here's a real question though, why live life regretting when you should life without regret. It's how I live.

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Wow. What a read.
I won't refute or argue anything here as SMO has proven herself once again to be THE PRIMARY DOLPHIN of this site. But there are one or two questions I'd shake the scorpion bucket with...

1. if ISLAM is the fastest growing religion that doesn't mean it's the best religion. Meth may be the fastest growing drug of choice but it ain't good. So the question stands; why IS it the fastest growing religion? I side with Comrade Theocritus: desire to stop thinking due to a)fear and b)loathing (AKA the Mime)

2. as SMO said in an earlier post, the religion of Islam once sported some of the greater cultural highlights of human civilization. So, question, why is almost every predominantly Muslim nation now a sinkhole? Why are their no Averroesses, Avicennas, Khalid ibn Yazids or Yaqub ibn Tariqs? Why is there no current Mezquitas or Alcazars or Badshahi Masjids? Muslims in space? Muslim movie stars? Muslim poets? Muslim philosophers? Muslim politicians on a par with Abraham Lincoln or Benjamin Disraeli or Winston Churchill? Where is all this greatness? hell, where are the sufis and the whole contemplative branch of Islam popular in the 10th century?

3. sure Allah has said submit; that's understood. but if Allah is the same as Yahweh (or Krishna or the creating force) then why would Yahweh suggest not submission but freedom, love, and acceptance? why would Krishna proclaim self-abnegation and interior peace? why would the Buddhists suggest that the god is within? Is the God saying one thing to some and another thing to others? or maybe he means well but he's just confused.

4. perhaps Islam is a religion of peace as Huma Ahmad suggests. What does that mean? Buddhist interior peace by the practice of no mind? the peace that passeth understanding? the peace after battle or death? the peace of complete uniformity in action/thought/appearance? the peace that occurs once all your foes are killed or enslaved?

5. sure there are atrocities in the Western world; the capacity for evil in the human heart is abysmal. But when was the last time a Jew blew himself up in a public place killing innocent bystanders? When was the last Buddhist stoning of relatives? How long has it been since the Hindus blew up a major edifice or building filled with people who never meant them any harm? Where are the agnostics who are slaughtering people who disagree with them? When did a Raelian put a knife through a cartoonists heart? How often have we heard of the Mormons proclaiming an international bounty on the head of some author who wrote against them? Maybe it's just that the press are opposed to Islam and so only report the accounts of Islamic terror. But if not, why has Islam come to this? Isn't violence the last refuge of the incompetent? Wouldn't such violence be more the earmark of a dying religion rather than a healthy growing religion?

6. and finally, (I promise) I've heard many times of people saying that they love Islam or that the sharia is the greatest expression of love or that Islam is a healthy, loving and peaceful religion, or that Muslims love their religion so much that they can't abide jokes about it. Seems to me that jokes, questions, conversations, discussions between individuals (whether creatures or creators) are what punctuate love. IF I am incapable of joking with my beloved, that isn't love, that fear. IF I am incapable of questioning my beloved and sharing with her the terrifying questions to which my prefrontal perambulation lead me, that isn't love it's cowardice. IF I am unable to converse or discuss with my beloved about the things necessary to living b/c she is so superior to everything that I can possibly ever achieve, that isn't love it's IDOLATRY! I don't know about Islam but one of the first commandments in Judaism and Christianity is that thou shalt not make any graven images or bow down to any idols. To that idea I find myself submitting with growing understanding, love, humor, and questions.

Enuff, I trow.

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Oh, and as long as we are plagiarizing cutting and pasting allow me...

Faith, Reason and the University
Memories and Reflections

Your Eminences, Your Magnificences, Your Excellencies,
Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is a moving experience for me to be back again in the university and to be able once again to give a lecture at this podium. I think back to those years when, after a pleasant period at the Freisinger Hochschule, I began teaching at the University of Bonn. That was in 1959, in the days of the old university made up of ordinary professors. The various chairs had neither assistants nor secretaries, but in recompense there was much direct contact with students and in particular among the professors themselves. We would meet before and after lessons in the rooms of the teaching staff. There was a lively exchange with historians, philosophers, philologists and, naturally, between the two theological faculties. Once a semester there was a dies academicus, when professors from every faculty appeared before the students of the entire university, making possible a genuine experience of universitas - something that you too, Magnificent Rector, just mentioned - the experience, in other words, of the fact that despite our specializations which at times make it difficult to communicate with each other, we made up a whole, working in everything on the basis of a single rationality with its various aspects and sharing responsibility for the right use of reason - this reality became a lived experience. The university was also very proud of its two theological faculties. It was clear that, by inquiring about the reasonableness of faith, they too carried out a work which is necessarily part of the "whole" of the universitas scientiarum, even if not everyone could share the faith which theologians seek to correlate with reason as a whole. This profound sense of coherence within the universe of reason was not troubled, even when it was once reported that a colleague had said there was something odd about our university: it had two faculties devoted to something that did not exist: God. That even in the face of such radical scepticism it is still necessary and reasonable to raise the question of God through the use of reason, and to do so in the context of the tradition of the Christian faith: this, within the university as a whole, was accepted without question.

I was reminded of all this recently, when I read the edition by Professor Theodore Khoury (Münster) of part of the dialogue carried on - perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara - by the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus and an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam, and the truth of both.[1] It was presumably the emperor himself who set down this dialogue, during the siege of Constantinople between 1394 and 1402; and this would explain why his arguments are given in greater detail than those of his Persian interlocutor.[2] The dialogue ranges widely over the structures of faith contained in the Bible and in the Qur'an, and deals especially with the image of God and of man, while necessarily returning repeatedly to the relationship between - as they were called - three "Laws" or "rules of life": the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Qur'an. It is not my intention to discuss this question in the present lecture; here I would like to discuss only one point - itself rather marginal to the dialogue as a whole - which, in the context of the issue of "faith and reason", I found interesting and which can serve as the starting-point for my reflections on this issue.

In the seventh conversation (διάλεξις - controversy) edited by Professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the holy war. The emperor must have known that surah 2, 256 reads: "There is no compulsion in religion". According to some of the experts, this is probably one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Qur'an, concerning holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the "Book" and the "infidels", he addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness, a brusqueness that we find unacceptable, on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”[3] The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God", he says, "is not pleased by blood - and not acting reasonably (σὺν λόγω) is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death...".[4]

The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature.[5] The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality.[6] Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazm went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God's will, we would even have to practise idolatry.[7]

At this point, as far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of religion is concerned, we are faced with an unavoidable dilemma. Is the conviction that acting unreasonably contradicts God's nature merely a Greek idea, or is it always and intrinsically true? I believe that here we can see the profound harmony between what is Greek in the best sense of the word and the biblical understanding of faith in God. Modifying the first verse of the Book of Genesis, the first verse of the whole Bible, John began the prologue of his Gospel with the words: "In the beginning was the λόγος". This is the very word used by the emperor: God acts, σὺν λόγω, with logos. Logos means both reason and word - a reason which is creative and capable of self-communication, precisely as reason. John thus spoke the final word on the biblical concept of God, and in this word all the often toilsome and tortuous threads of biblical faith find their culmination and synthesis. In the beginning was the logos, and the logos is God, says the Evangelist. The encounter between the Biblical message and Greek thought did not happen by chance. The vision of Saint Paul, who saw the roads to Asia barred and in a dream saw a Macedonian man plead with him: "Come over to Macedonia and help us!" (cf. Acts 16:6-10) - this vision can be interpreted as a "distillation" of the intrinsic necessity of a rapprochement between Biblical faith and Greek inquiry.

In point of fact, this rapprochement had been going on for some time. The mysterious name of God, revealed from the burning bush, a name which separates this God from all other divinities with their many names and simply asserts being, "I am", already presents a challenge to the notion of myth, to which Socrates' attempt to vanquish and transcend myth stands in close analogy.[8] Within the Old Testament, the process which started at the burning bush came to new maturity at the time of the Exile, when the God of Israel, an Israel now deprived of its land and worship, was proclaimed as the God of heaven and earth and described in a simple formula which echoes the words uttered at the burning bush: "I am". This new understanding of God is accompanied by a kind of enlightenment, which finds stark expression in the mockery of gods who are merely the work of human hands (cf. Ps 115). Thus, despite the bitter conflict with those Hellenistic rulers who sought to accommodate it forcibly to the customs and idolatrous cult of the Greeks, biblical faith, in the Hellenistic period, encountered the best of Greek thought at a deep level, resulting in a mutual enrichment evident especially in the later wisdom literature. Today we know that the Greek translation of the Old Testament produced at Alexandria - the Septuagint - is more than a simple (and in that sense really less than satisfactory) translation of the Hebrew text: it is an independent textual witness and a distinct and important step in the history of revelation, one which brought about this encounter in a way that was decisive for the birth and spread of Christianity.[9] A profound encounter of faith and reason is taking place here, an encounter between genuine enlightenment and religion. From the very heart of Christian faith and, at the same time, the heart of Greek thought now joined to faith, Manuel II was able to say: Not to act "with logos" is contrary to God's nature.

In all honesty, one must observe that in the late Middle Ages we find trends in theology which would sunder this synthesis between the Greek spirit and the Christian spirit. In contrast with the so-called intellectualism of Augustine and Thomas, there arose with Duns Scotus a voluntarism which, in its later developments, led to the claim that we can only know God's voluntas ordinata. Beyond this is the realm of God's freedom, in virtue of which he could have done the opposite of everything he has actually done. This gives rise to positions which clearly approach those of Ibn Hazm and might even lead to the image of a capricious God, who is not even bound to truth and goodness. God's transcendence and otherness are so exalted that our reason, our sense of the true and good, are no longer an authentic mirror of God, whose deepest possibilities remain eternally unattainable and hidden behind his actual decisions. As opposed to this, the faith of the Church has always insisted that between God and us, between his eternal Creator Spirit and our created reason there exists a real analogy, in which - as the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 stated - unlikeness remains infinitely greater than likeness, yet not to the point of abolishing analogy and its language. God does not become more divine when we push him away from us in a sheer, impenetrable voluntarism; rather, the truly divine God is the God who has revealed himself as logos and, as logos, has acted and continues to act lovingly on our behalf. Certainly, love, as Saint Paul says, "transcends" knowledge and is thereby capable of perceiving more than thought alone (cf. Eph 3:19); nonetheless it continues to be love of the God who is Logos. Consequently, Christian worship is, again to quote Paul - "λογικη λατρεία", worship in harmony with the eternal Word and with our reason (cf. Rom 12:1).[10]

This inner rapprochement between Biblical faith and Greek philosophical inquiry was an event of decisive importance not only from the standpoint of the history of religions, but also from that of world history - it is an event which concerns us even today. Given this convergence, it is not surprising that Christianity, despite its origins and some significant developments in the East, finally took on its historically decisive character in Europe. We can also express this the other way around: this convergence, with the subsequent addition of the Roman heritage, created Europe and remains the foundation of what can rightly be called Europe.

The thesis that the critically purified Greek heritage forms an integral part of Christian faith has been countered by the call for a dehellenization of Christianity - a call which has more and more dominated theological discussions since the beginning of the modern age. Viewed more closely, three stages can be observed in the programme of dehellenization: although interconnected, they are clearly distinct from one another in their motivations and objectives.[11]

Dehellenization first emerges in connection with the postulates of the Reformation in the sixteenth century. Looking at the tradition of scholastic theology, the Reformers thought they were confronted with a faith system totally conditioned by philosophy, that is to say an articulation of the faith based on an alien system of thought. As a result, faith no longer appeared as a living historical Word but as one element of an overarching philosophical system. The principle of sola scriptura, on the other hand, sought faith in its pure, primordial form, as originally found in the biblical Word. Metaphysics appeared as a premise derived from another source, from which faith had to be liberated in order to become once more fully itself. When Kant stated that he needed to set thinking aside in order to make room for faith, he carried this programme forward with a radicalism that the Reformers could never have foreseen. He thus anchored faith exclusively in practical reason, denying it access to reality as a whole.

The liberal theology of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries ushered in a second stage in the process of dehellenization, with Adolf von Harnack as its outstanding representative. When I was a student, and in the early years of my teaching, this programme was highly influential in Catholic theology too. It took as its point of departure Pascal's distinction between the God of the philosophers and the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In my inaugural lecture at Bonn in 1959, I tried to address the issue,[12] and I do not intend to repeat here what I said on that occasion, but I would like to describe at least briefly what was new about this second stage of dehellenization. Harnack's central idea was to return simply to the man Jesus and to his simple message, underneath the accretions of theology and indeed of hellenization: this simple message was seen as the culmination of the religious development of humanity. Jesus was said to have put an end to worship in favour of morality. In the end he was presented as the father of a humanitarian moral message. Fundamentally, Harnack's goal was to bring Christianity back into harmony with modern reason, liberating it, that is to say, from seemingly philosophical and theological elements, such as faith in Christ's divinity and the triune God. In this sense, historical-critical exegesis of the New Testament, as he saw it, restored to theology its place within the university: theology, for Harnack, is something essentially historical and therefore strictly scientific. What it is able to say critically about Jesus is, so to speak, an expression of practical reason and consequently it can take its rightful place within the university. Behind this thinking lies the modern self-limitation of reason, classically expressed in Kant's "Critiques", but in the meantime further radicalized by the impact of the natural sciences. This modern concept of reason is based, to put it briefly, on a synthesis between Platonism (Cartesianism) and empiricism, a synthesis confirmed by the success of technology. On the one hand it presupposes the mathematical structure of matter, its intrinsic rationality, which makes it possible to understand how matter works and use it efficiently: this basic premise is, so to speak, the Platonic element in the modern understanding of nature. On the other hand, there is nature's capacity to be exploited for our purposes, and here only the possibility of verification or falsification through experimentation can yield decisive certainty. The weight between the two poles can, depending on the circumstances, shift from one side to the other. As strongly positivistic a thinker as J. Monod has declared himself a convinced Platonist/Cartesian.

This gives rise to two principles which are crucial for the issue we have raised. First, only the kind of certainty resulting from the interplay of mathematical and empirical elements can be considered scientific. Anything that would claim to be science must be measured against this criterion. Hence the human sciences, such as history, psychology, sociology and philosophy, attempt to conform themselves to this canon of scientificity. A second point, which is important for our reflections, is that by its very nature this method excludes the question of God, making it appear an unscientific or pre-scientific question. Consequently, we are faced with a reduction of the radius of science and reason, one which needs to be questioned.

I will return to this problem later. In the meantime, it must be observed that from this standpoint any attempt to maintain theology's claim to be "scientific" would end up reducing Christianity to a mere fragment of its former self. But we must say more: if science as a whole is this and this alone, then it is man himself who ends up being reduced, for the specifically human questions about our origin and destiny, the questions raised by religion and ethics, then have no place within the purview of collective reason as defined by "science", so understood, and must thus be relegated to the realm of the subjective. The subject then decides, on the basis of his experiences, what he considers tenable in matters of religion, and the subjective "conscience" becomes the sole arbiter of what is ethical. In this way, though, ethics and religion lose their power to create a community and become a completely personal matter. This is a dangerous state of affairs for humanity, as we see from the disturbing pathologies of religion and reason which necessarily erupt when reason is so reduced that questions of religion and ethics no longer concern it. Attempts to construct an ethic from the rules of evolution or from psychology and sociology, end up being simply inadequate.

Before I draw the conclusions to which all this has been leading, I must briefly refer to the third stage of dehellenization, which is now in progress. In the light of our experience with cultural pluralism, it is often said nowadays that the synthesis with Hellenism achieved in the early Church was an initial inculturation which ought not to be binding on other cultures. The latter are said to have the right to return to the simple message of the New Testament prior to that inculturation, in order to inculturate it anew in their own particular milieux. This thesis is not simply false, but it is coarse and lacking in precision. The New Testament was written in Greek and bears the imprint of the Greek spirit, which had already come to maturity as the Old Testament developed. True, there are elements in the evolution of the early Church which do not have to be integrated into all cultures. Nonetheless, the fundamental decisions made about the relationship between faith and the use of human reason are part of the faith itself; they are developments consonant with the nature of faith itself.

And so I come to my conclusion. This attempt, painted with broad strokes, at a critique of modern reason from within has nothing to do with putting the clock back to the time before the Enlightenment and rejecting the insights of the modern age. The positive aspects of modernity are to be acknowledged unreservedly: we are all grateful for the marvellous possibilities that it has opened up for mankind and for the progress in humanity that has been granted to us. The scientific ethos, moreover, is - as you yourself mentioned, Magnificent Rector - the will to be obedient to the truth, and, as such, it embodies an attitude which belongs to the essential decisions of the Christian spirit. The intention here is not one of retrenchment or negative criticism, but of broadening our concept of reason and its application. While we rejoice in the new possibilities open to humanity, we also see the dangers arising from these possibilities and we must ask ourselves how we can overcome them. We will succeed in doing so only if reason and faith come together in a new way, if we overcome the self-imposed limitation of reason to the empirically falsifiable, and if we once more disclose its vast horizons. In this sense theology rightly belongs in the university and within the wide-ranging dialogue of sciences, not merely as a historical discipline and one of the human sciences, but precisely as theology, as inquiry into the rationality of faith.

Only thus do we become capable of that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today. In the Western world it is widely held that only positivistic reason and the forms of philosophy based on it are universally valid. Yet the world's profoundly religious cultures see this exclusion of the divine from the universality of reason as an attack on their most profound convictions. A reason which is deaf to the divine and which relegates religion into the realm of subcultures is incapable of entering into the dialogue of cultures. At the same time, as I have attempted to show, modern scientific reason with its intrinsically Platonic element bears within itself a question which points beyond itself and beyond the possibilities of its methodology. Modern scientific reason quite simply has to accept the rational structure of matter and the correspondence between our spirit and the prevailing rational structures of nature as a given, on which its methodology has to be based. Yet the question why this has to be so is a real question, and one which has to be remanded by the natural sciences to other modes and planes of thought - to philosophy and theology. For philosophy and, albeit in a different way, for theology, listening to the great experiences and insights of the religious traditions of humanity, and those of the Christian faith in particular, is a source of knowledge, and to ignore it would be an unacceptable restriction of our listening and responding. Here I am reminded of something Socrates said to Phaedo. In their earlier conversations, many false philosophical opinions had been raised, and so Socrates says: "It would be easily understandable if someone became so annoyed at all these false notions that for the rest of his life he despised and mocked all talk about being - but in this way he would be deprived of the truth of existence and would suffer a great loss".[13] The West has long been endangered by this aversion to the questions which underlie its rationality, and can only suffer great harm thereby. The courage to engage the whole breadth of reason, and not the denial of its grandeur - this is the programme with which a theology grounded in Biblical faith enters into the debates of our time. "Not to act reasonably, not to act with logos, is contrary to the nature of God", said Manuel II, according to his Christian understanding of God, in response to his Persian interlocutor. It is to this great logos, to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures. To rediscover it constantly is the great task of the university.

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Rex wrote:Yahweh suggest not submission but freedom, love, and acceptance?
It is the common conception that Christ preached that, and it's true but he also advocated conquering unbelievers; I've tried to remember where I found it but can't. And the Old Testament is <a href="https://skepticsannotatedbible.com/crue ... html">very full</a> of cruelty. Let's not forget Torquemada.

But that was then, and this is now. Much sport is made of fundamentalist Christians but as my brother said, "They make good neighbors." A conservative Baptist may not approve of me but will probably be civil and will certainly not burn down my house. Or cause a wall to fall on me, as the Koran specifies. In fact my CPA is a conservative Baptist, my neighbor, and one of my best friends.

The hard thing is that people crave certainty because it's easy. You don't have to watch over your shoulder all the time. Or think that you don't have to. This explains the sale of all religions and I'm not against religion; I'm against evil deeds. Mean people will use the tools to hand to express their meanness.

But, and I'm not in the least bit religious, I prefer a Christian nation. A devout Christian believes that God orders all. The secular human being believes in a secular, here-and-now order. Because there is no judge in the hereafter, things have to be made perfect now, and that's where the endless regulations come in. Instead of just getting on with things, everything has to be settled to perfection <i>now</i>. And that is why, I think, they are willing to submit.

I really thought this lot all believed that they could sit in the driver's seat but I now believe that most of them crave the certainty, the order, the knowledge that their actions don't have consequences if they follow the rules du jour of the current leftist dogma. All of this for a secular redemption.

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How do I add to either of your posts, is a hard task, but I will do what I can. Being who I am, here is the way I see my religion (Christianity, Luthrenism specificly). Out of order comes good things, and God is order, his Word made/makes order, therefore, follow God's way, and your life will be in order. If you stray from His way, you can ask for forgivness, and be put back onto the path. You will stray from his path, because we aren't perfect, and that's o.k.

However, out of chaos comes chaos. Here's another way of describing that. Out of human desires, wants, notions, out of human carnality comes nothing.

Oh, and Commisar Theocrities, I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but here is how I see people who are secular, who are pagens. It is those who truth resent God, those who truly deny him and follow their own, selfish ways who will perish.

People like you Commisar, who resent evil people, who though you don't believe in God, have a good heart, and treat people with respect and good intentions and wills, you will be saved. Maybe you don't believe in an afterlife, maybe you took this the wrong way, and I'm sorry for that. However, seeing good people like you perish just doesn't sound like something my God would do. My God would save those with a good heart.

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Thank you, Elliott; I am never fool enough to resent the good wishes of others. In your view that good people do not burn in hell I think that you agree with JPII.

Frankly when I was a kid what I feared more than anything else was eternity. I feared heaven as much as hell. I loathed church; it was mind-numbingly boring; the Church of Christ in the 60s was tedious when it was scaring children to tears. There was <i>nothing</i> beyond burning in hell and they talked about the love of God. Yeah.

I was about six and the song leader, Charlie Smith, said that heaven would be an eternity of praising God, which was what we were doing in church. The four hours a week (20 twice a year with meetings) were the bane of my existence. I could think of nothing worse.

But then the preacher said that Jesus would come when were least expecting it. I thought that we could set up a relay of people looking above and saying, "Jesus, I'm waiting for you now..." and when one got tired another would start up. This would keep Jesus from coming. It's like Jesse Jackson fasting--which he does until he gets hungry and someone else, who's just eaten, fasts.

I don't know if it's good or bad for a child of six to be that sophistical.

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Commissar Theocritis,

While I enjoyed reading your theology discussions, I just want to remind you that there is no religion in the World of Next Tuesday! The State is everything to everyone. We have quite a few new recruits watching and listening to you, especially, Oh sage one, but you might be setting a bad example by going on so, about religion, of all topics. You are confusing the hell out of these new soldiers for the cause! I'm sure that Comrades Abecedarius Rex and Elliot would be more than happy to e-mail you, privately. I implore you, Sir! Do not be angry at me for my astute observation. I am looking out for you, always!

your loyal comrade,
Che' Gourmet

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You are right, Che; I am detracting from the Progressive World of Next Tuesday™ which is a religion in and of itself.

The PWNT gives us all we need. We devote all our energies to the PWNT. Nothing outside the PWNT, all for the PWNT. Mussolini would be <i>so</i> proud.

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Commissar Theocritus wrote:
Rex wrote:Yahweh suggest not submission but freedom, love, and acceptance?
It is the common conception that Christ preached that, and it's true but he also advocated conquering unbelievers; I've tried to remember where I found it but can't. And the Old Testament is <a href="https://skepticsannotatedbible.com/crue ... html">very full</a> of cruelty. Let's not forget Torquemada.

But that was then, and this is now. Much sport is made of fundamentalist Christians but as my brother said, "They make good neighbors." A conservative Baptist may not approve of me but will probably be civil and will certainly not burn down my house. Or cause a wall to fall on me, as the Koran specifies. In fact my CPA is a conservative Baptist, my neighbor, and one of my best friends.

The hard thing is that people crave certainty because it's easy. You don't have to watch over your shoulder all the time. Or think that you don't have to. This explains the sale of all religions and I'm not against religion; I'm against evil deeds. Mean people will use the tools to hand to express their meanness.

But, and I'm not in the least bit religious, I prefer a Christian nation. A devout Christian believes that God orders all. The secular human being believes in a secular, here-and-now order. Because there is no judge in the hereafter, things have to be made perfect now, and that's where the endless regulations come in. Instead of just getting on with things, everything has to be settled to perfection <i>now</i>. And that is why, I think, they are willing to submit.

I really thought this lot all believed that they could sit in the driver's seat but I now believe that most of them crave the certainty, the order, the knowledge that their actions don't have consequences if they follow the rules du jour of the current leftist dogma. All of this for a secular redemption.

And this is why I respect and admire you, comrade. I'm of an age where I believe that IF NOTHING ELSE religion is a way of looking at the word in order for us to deal with consciousness. Consciousness is a bitch b/c it forces us to consider, make decisions, live with the consequences, w/o ever having absolute certainty in the thing. But how we percieve The God and how we percieve our relationship to The God makes all the world of difference btwn the monster and the hero. This is why I posted the long passage from Benedict's Regensberg address.

Logos. Order. The order that allows us to comprehend the universe, God, ourselves. Either the universe is, or it isn't. Or more to the point, either we commit to seeing it as such (even contrary to the burning reality of chaos) and can function autonomously, or we commit to denying it as such and so give over our reason, responsibility, and free will to some other greater institution. The first is freedom, the second is death.

In my darkest moments I think that there is llittle hope for us as a race; the trail of carnage and brutality is long and slick with the blood of innocents. What draws me out again is the thought that this world has a LOGOS, an order b/c blessitall, I say it does. And that word, or order which I make manifest to others through my thought, example, attempts at goodness, allows things to made and nothing is made that is not made through that. It may be that God is reasonabless itself (as Aquinas and Boethius seem to suggest), w/o acceptance of which there is no longer argument or art or thought or goodness. The commitment to goodness and the order of goodness is the light of the world; a light that shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot comprehend it.

Anyway. Have to go teach Robert Frost to 10th graders...

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The left started some decades ago with moral relativism, probably out of generosity. "Who am I," I can hear some kind but short-sighted people say, "to judge other people's world views?" It's seductive. It's easy. It means that you don't <i>have</i> to make an objective choice, and it relegates ethics to tastes.

It also lets nasty people do what they want to, and it lets people say that Puff Daddy is as good as Mozart.

Then it's a short step to nihilism, where nothing matters. Want to do it? Why not? Kill someone? Why not? It might be a thrill.

I rather like the idea of a decent religion, although I have none. To a great extent I am of course informed by the Christian upbringing, and fine parents, that I had. But instead of relying on a God, I am forced to rely utterly on my own judgment. A Christian has to surrender to God, but if I do not want to beat myself up endlessly over my failings, then I have to surrender to my own sense of failing. Make amends, if necessary and possible, and then go on.


 
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