Re: MD Christianity v. Islam (v. Whatever)

From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Tue Aug 30 2005 - 22:09:59 BST

  • Next message: David M: "Re: MD Essentialist and anti-essentialist"

    Hi Khaled

    On 29 Aug. you wrote:

    > Just a small comet.

    I guess this was for Arlo and Platt who keep throwing Koran
    Sures at each other, but I can't help responding, it's an extremely
    interesting issue.

    > When has to look at the dynamics of the messenger. When Jesus came He
    > was reforming an established religion under Roman ruling.
     
    Yes, he was, but I can't help wielding the MOQ. The "movement"
    called SOM - the intellectual level IMO - had been brewing for
    some centuries in Greece and had surely made it over to the
    southern shore of the Mediterranean so Jesus' reformation was to
    add intellectual value to Judaism. Something the high priest
    didn't appreciate.

    > He was not challenging Caesar. The Romans looked at it as an internal
    > strife between their subjects.

    Right!
     
    > When Mohammed came he was challenging the whole establishment. First
    > he fled, then he fought.

    In an earlier message you said:

    > 1. Look at map and see where Mecca is, Not that far form the holy land. 2.
    > Mohammed's brother in law was a christian priest. ( his first wife's
    > brother) 3. Jews and Christian were in the neighborhood. Islam did not
    > come in a vacuum 4. Mecca was already a pilgrimage destination, for what
    > religion (s) I don't know 5. The old testament and the Koran agree on 99%
    > of the story. ( the exception being Abraham's sacrifice

    It rightly sounds like Mohammed saw some corruption to the
    existing tradition by by Christians and their complicated dogmas.

    > So when Islam was established, it had to become The religion, the law
    > and the government.

    Yes, but that is the nature of religions. There can't be a secular
    state with laws separate from those given by Allah or Jahveh,, or
    God. Christianity was no exception in its first millennium when
    emperors and kings had to come to Rome to have their power
    sanctified. And even if Israel is a secular state the orthodox Jews
    don't recognize its directives as we have seen.

    > It had to do that in order to survive back then.

    Yes, religion is the foremost social ordering system, not only the
    monotheist ones, the Myths of old were also the cement of
    society, so it was to the ancient Norse, the Greeks and surely to
    every culture. Later when the secular rulers appeared they had -
    as said - have their power sanctified by the clergy.

    > That was then and it DOES NOT work today.

    No, it does not.

    Bo

    MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
    Mail Archives:
    Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
    Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
    MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net

    To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
    http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html



    This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Tue Aug 30 2005 - 23:17:48 BST