CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS 3
I once wrote in a comment to another blog that there were far more people killed in the name of Christianity than there were people killed in the name of Islam. The response to that was pretty funny. “Who have the Christians ever killed?” “He must be talking about the Nazis. Those weren’t Christian killings.” And so on until it was dismissed.
No, I hadn’t even thought about the Nazis; although now that you mention it…
The Jews bragged about their slaughters in the Old Testament. It seemed like 50,000 Philistines were slew on every page. (The poor Philistines, where are they today?)
The Christians, in a reversal of roles, could only mention how persecuted they were. The slaughters came later.
I will ignore the Crusades and the Inquisition among other things too numerous to count.
In the age of discovery, the pope divided the known world in half between Portugal and Spain. That was to avoid conflict between the two primary Catholic seafaring nations and to insure that all lands and peoples encountered came under the influence of the Catholic Church. Catholic priests accompanied almost all voyages.
Hence the adventures in South America. In South America alone, the Christians were responsible for more deaths than the Muslims could claim in their history. The reason given for the invasion of South America was to convert the savages to Chrisianity. The real reason was gold.
In more modern times, the French used the Christian Missionary ruse to expand their empire. They sent missionaries first to convert a number of the natives. At the first sign of problems, real or imagined, with the host regime, the French sent in their military and conquered the entire country. That is what happened in Indo-China which led to a war you may have heard about.
The Japanese were clever. They recognized the ruse and severely limited the operations of the missionaries, confining them to a single location and overseeing their behavior.
The point of this segment is that the Christians cannot take a holier than thou attitude toward the Muslims in the matter of converting by the sword.
Muslims have converted people by killing and conquest.
Christians have converted people by killing and conquest.
They have both done this.
They are much the same in this respect.
No, I hadn’t even thought about the Nazis; although now that you mention it…
The Jews bragged about their slaughters in the Old Testament. It seemed like 50,000 Philistines were slew on every page. (The poor Philistines, where are they today?)
The Christians, in a reversal of roles, could only mention how persecuted they were. The slaughters came later.
I will ignore the Crusades and the Inquisition among other things too numerous to count.
In the age of discovery, the pope divided the known world in half between Portugal and Spain. That was to avoid conflict between the two primary Catholic seafaring nations and to insure that all lands and peoples encountered came under the influence of the Catholic Church. Catholic priests accompanied almost all voyages.
Hence the adventures in South America. In South America alone, the Christians were responsible for more deaths than the Muslims could claim in their history. The reason given for the invasion of South America was to convert the savages to Chrisianity. The real reason was gold.
In more modern times, the French used the Christian Missionary ruse to expand their empire. They sent missionaries first to convert a number of the natives. At the first sign of problems, real or imagined, with the host regime, the French sent in their military and conquered the entire country. That is what happened in Indo-China which led to a war you may have heard about.
The Japanese were clever. They recognized the ruse and severely limited the operations of the missionaries, confining them to a single location and overseeing their behavior.
The point of this segment is that the Christians cannot take a holier than thou attitude toward the Muslims in the matter of converting by the sword.
Muslims have converted people by killing and conquest.
Christians have converted people by killing and conquest.
They have both done this.
They are much the same in this respect.
posted by Walter Guest at 3:17 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home