My dear friends, I am sure that no religion said to fight the people and kill them because they had another faith. No religion from the God prevented their followers to live in peace with the other people even if they have another faith. The people are who ignited the wars by the name of the religion and not the religion which ordered them to ignite the wars.

When a guest descended on the prophet Abraham, he (Abraham) slaughtered a sheep for him and after preparing the food for him, Abraham asked him; what do u worship. the guest answered " I worship the fire". Abraham told him to go out and do not eat. At the same time an angel descended down and ask Abraham. Oh Abraham, how old this guest. Abraham answered 90 years. The angel said to him that God blame u and say to u " If I (the God) am tolerating him and feed him 90 years while he was worshiping other than me, you (Abraham) can not tolerate him once.

God did not ask any one to harm the others but we are the human kind who harm our brothers and sisters and then we accuse the religions.

Views: 261

Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

I really don't know what I can say to this, as well as some of the other replies I've gotten, since I'll be left simply reiterating my points, which none of the objections address.

My main point, in direct response to the question of this thread, is that religions, ALL of them, since the dawn of time, have been used by the powerful of the world to manipulate and exploit the powerless. Some of this manipulation took the form of war, torture, and persecution. Furthermore, despite the fact that the scriptures of EVERY religion that I know of call for peace and love, and forbid murder, the practitioners of ALL OF THESE religions, since the dawn of time, have had no problems ignoring these passages while killing, torturing, and persecuting their neighbors.

Therefore, I feel that whatever lip service religions pay to peace, they have never inspired peaceful behavior in people on a scale any larger than an individual or a small community.

My conclusion was that religion did not stand up to a risk-to-benefit analysis, when it came to furthering the cause of peace. Furthermore, I personally find despicable the way it is used to control public opinion and manipulate people into furthering some shortsighted political agendas that are clearly detrimental to them and to everyone else, especially where it leads to perpetuating problems like overpopulation and exploitation of fully half the adherents by the other half.

What I've gotten in reply are more examples of how individuals were influenced by their religious beliefs to pursue the cause of peace. And more quotes from scripture and calls for universal love, peace, unity, and seeing the God in everyone.

While these individuals may be admirable, they are only a tiny drop in the ocean of misery and intolerance that religion has brought about, century after century. Their existence has no bearing on any points I made. Even less useful are the comments that boil down to "let's all just get along". I agree with the message, getting along is definitely a step toward peace, but if this was meant to be a discussion, then we need to address points, not sing Kum Ba Yah. There's a time and a place for that too, but a forum is not the most convenient way of doing it...
OK, here's a point of pure logic that DOES refute your points. You state that ALL religions "have been used by the powerful of the world to manipulate and exploit the powerless." To refute that point requires only ONE example of a religion that has not.

Now, I suppose that depends on how you define religion. I'll go with Random House. It's the first definition that comes up on Dictionary.com, and is substantively the same as the rest.

"Religion: 1) a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs."

By that definition, the spiritual movement of which I am a part is a religion. It is an organization of people who have voluntarily come together and declared shared beliefs about the nature of the universe and of humanity, one which cannot be proven or disproven empirically. And yet it oppresses no one, has never been used to justify war or torture or to condone economic disparities. It celebrates all sexual orientations as manifestations of God, as it does with both sexes and all ages and all nationalities and all people, period. It has never required any person to do literal or figurative violence to him or herself, or deny or suppress his or her essential nature. It has never denied condoms to anyone in Africa, and there are more women than men in ministry in the movement. It is, however, a religion.

I don't expect everyone to share this list of--let's face it--exceptionally liberal viewpoints. Nor do I declare that anyone who rejects one or more of them on religious grounds is automatically an obstacle to peace. I'm merely offering them as an example of a religion that cannot possibly, in any way, be construed as such an obstacle.

But how about more established and, arguably, more conservative, traditions? How did the Black Church in America ever act as an agent of oppression wielded by the powerful? On the contrary, it was a stimulant for those fighting oppression, the precise opposite of an opiate of the people. Religion was a reason to say, "As children of God, we demand our birthright!"

How about the Society of Friends (the Quakers)? How are generations of conscientious objectors culpable for the perpetuation of violence?

Sure, one can argue that any belief that isn't based on observation of material reality is irrational, even a waste of time. But even if you're not willing to accept that some religious beliefs actually promote peace, at least acknowledge that they're not obstructing it any more than are gardening or stamp collecting. To suggest otherwise is patently unfair.

Now, if the discussion is to proceed to what to DO ABOUT religiously-motivated obstacles to peace, I have a simple answer: oppose them. But do so respectfully. Universal freedom of religion is the answer, as far as I'm concerned. I'd like to see a world in which ruling elites NEVER have the power to impose their religious beliefs on others; where anyone, anywhere, has the unfettered right to worship or not, believe or not, without interference from any authority. Within that framework, though, "just getting along" is not an impractical or naive notion. It's essential. Honoring and accepting the voluntary subjective beliefs of others--even while disagreeing with them--promotes peace. Declaring that ALL religion must "go the way of the dodo bird" before progress can be made just makes people--meaning me--feel attacked and defensive.
Hey, that's better, now there IS something to discuss.

You are right, it only requires one example of a benign religion to counter my point that they are all poisonous. At that point, the strongest argument I could make would be that the absolute majority of religions are poisonous, in which case the the answer would be: we should all stick with that nice one, or adapt its qualities to others.

It's also a nice touch to start by defining the subject in question, and dictionaries are pretty good for that.

I'll also accept the definition you quoted. So we have three points by which to judge something a religion: a) it is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, b) it usually involves devotional and ritual observances, and c) it often contains a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

And I'll argue that by that definition the spiritual movement to which you belong is an antithesis to religion, and here's why. I've looked up the church's website, and, at least according to it, it is definitely NOT "organization of people who have voluntarily come together and declared shared beliefs about the nature of the universe and of humanity": as there is no shared belief about the nature of the universe it advocates. No church that welcomes people of all religions (including those who have none) and spiritual paths to become members of its congregation without first denouncing their beliefs, and exchanging them for the ones it advances can claim to belong to a specific religion. It is more like a social club: you all agree to respect each other's specific beliefs, while agreeing only on the most abstract generalities, and show up to worship in your own way, but in a shared context.

Religions, at their very core, not only define the context of spirituality (i.e. customs, like we'll all worship on n-th day of the week, wear a specially shaped hat, avoid eating these foods, etc), but insist on defining the CONTENT of that spirituality: there's only (one, three, a thousand) god(s), and their prophet's names are ___, and they created the universe in this specific way (danced it into being, spoke a word, they are it, etc), and here are the holy scriptures defining what you shall believe and how you shall behave. The reason all religions are like that, is because, in a certain light, they can all be viewed as viral memes: they propagate or they die out (and often never even come to our attention). So the religions that survive as such, do it by propagating their content, and insisting that it is the true and correct way. Not surprisingly, besides insisting that you believe X, all religions have a built in directive for you to spread them: some with the sword, some by knocking on people's doors and offering them pamphlets, and some (few) simply by being fruitful and multiplying.

Any belief system that doesn't really care what you believe in as long as you respect what your neihgbor believes in, and all agree to disagree is the opposite of religion, and when(if) religions all go the way of the dodo bird, that's what we'll be left with, some fuzzy-edged feel-good spirituality that uses a few lines out of thick volumes of scripture, and treats even those as symbolic and metaphoric, and only insists that you don't step on anyone's toes (unless they want you to, in which case that's your duty). That may be a pleasant way to spend your Sunday (Thursday, Friday, Saturday, etc) morning, but you'll never have zealots running around scaring, harassing, exploiting, or killing people. And this is a very good thing. If I were you, I'd jump at the chance to disassociate myself from the long and proud tradition of scaring, harassing, exploiting and killing that Christianity in particular can boast. I'd insist that your NOMINALLY Christian church only calls itself that so it can get the nonprofit organization status as a religious organization (the government types frown on people's inventing random religions, you have to belong to a recognized one to get perks), and because the (nominally) Christian doctrine it (nominally) espouses is more familiar and comforting to its largely Western congregation.

As for Quakers... yeah, they are very peaceful people. But they don't have a separate religion, they are a Christian sect, and therefore heir to all of Christian tradition, and you couldn't possibly argue that Christianity is a benign religion (because, well, you'd have to take ALL of it together, with its violent past AND present, its fundamentalists, its oppressive and contradictory scriptures that endorse things like slavery.) However, it seems that at least a number of Quaker communities have been drifting towards the same non-denominational spirituality concept (where they will accept atheists, agnostics and people of other faiths without these people changing their minds about the content of their beliefs), so I could only applaud their efforts to help eradicate organized religion.

I think I'd better shut up about the Black Church in America: I stand a good chance of seriously pissing off a lot of people, and it would be rather inappropriate to have a discussion thread on a website devoted to peace degenerate into a flame war. I'm game to privately discuss my opinions on the matter with you though.

I would be lying if I said that ALL my beliefs are based on exclusively on the observations of material reality. Human brains are hardwired to see patterns, regardless of whether these patterns are entirely supported by observation. Surprisingly enough, we often see the correct patterns even when we haven't observed everything we should have, to draw a conclusion. It's called intuition, and it seems particularly good at allowing us to get a better handle on complex processes, than we would if we were proceeding in a purely analytical fashion. If you are familiar with the Chaos Theory, this will make a little more sense (think butterfly effect). But it's as mystical as I get.

However, that doesn't mean that I automatically think that anyone waxing spiritual and believing a bunch of, what might sound to me like nonsensical mumbo-jumbo is an idiot, and worse yet, an obstacle to peace. What I do have a problem with is when people start ignoring hard facts and obvious trends because they don't fit in with what they believe based on nothing more than some philosophy or scripture or teachings of a guru. Sure, anyone and everyone has the right to believe what they will, and as long as your spirituality stays as private as stamp collecting, it's harmless. But that's not in the nature of religions.

As soon as your spirituality moves you to work towards a political goal, that's when you enter dangerous territory. It's not enough to have good intentions: you have to be meticulously realistic about what you want to accomplish and how you go about it, and your methodology had better not come from a book that's been debated and reshuffled for the last two thousand years. There's a saying, "the path to hell is paved with good intentions", and it is more correct today than ever, when we have unprecedented abilities to control how millions of people perceive the world. The good intentions of many a political leader are putting millions of people through hell as we speak.

Opposing "religiously-motivated obstacles to peace" is not as simple as saying it. They aren't clear cut. And to even see these obstacles, you have to disagree with the creed that produced them, because they are part of that creed. Here's an example.

The Catholic Church with its blind opposition to effective birth control believes it is protecting the dignity of human life. But because their beliefs are so wide-spread, many countries actually base their policies on them, discourage the use of effective birth control by their population, and limit access to it (not that the distinction makes a difference to people in remote impoverished villages). One of the effects of this policy is that people have a lot more children than they can afford to care for, as well as overwhelming any local infrastructure in place to help them, and these children starve and die of preventable diseases. So instead of protecting the dignity of human life, a lot of it ends up simply thrown away, and a lot more is left over for exploitation: nothing like a lot of hungry, desperate, ignorant people, whose lives are cheap and expendable to feed little bush wars. But, far and large, the Catholics, high or low, don't see a problem. The pope even has the nerve to talk about how overuse of resources is destroying the environment. And sure, the viral consumerism of the developed countries is a major contributing factor. But consumerism comes with a high standard of living, which we all agree is a good thing, and should be extended to everyone if at all possible. The problem is, there simply aren't enough resources to give it to as many people as there are. What we need is, certainly, less consumerism, but also a lot less people. In the developed countries as well as developing ones. What we need is not to have starving multitudes whose lives are so miserable and devoid of value even for them, that they are willing to let others throw those lives away. But you can't come to this conclusion as long as you are more concerned about the lives of dividing cells than you are about living, breathing, dying, suffering humans.

My problem with religion is not that it creates "religiously-motivated obstacles to peace", but that the obstacles to peace are part and parcel of a given belief system. You can't separate the two. Someone who believes that abortion is murder is morally obligated to blow up the abortion clinics, and every minute of every day they don't, they are allowing an atrocity comparable to the Holocaust. There are things, a lot of them, you can't simply agree to disagree on, for which there are no meaningful compromises. These things come down to what you believe, and if your belief is not grounded on observable, measurable reality and subject to constant and rigorous questioning, God help you.
I Loved this film, thank you!! It is so obvious we all need peace! It is not a luxury, it is a human necessity just like food and shelter! It is written on everybody´'s forehead, if only everybody will decide to learn how to read! Hope and confidence for the future!
Not to argue, but in both the King James Bible and the Holy Quran, I have read instructions to "kill" those of fasle religions and to "kill" Christians and Jews... But - we do have the freedom of choice to not follow those books and to follow our spirit, which is where the truth is...
Love is all that is needed - Love each other - all problems solved and not a big printing cost...
Agreed, brother. It's not in a book. Thanks.
Dear Brother,
Our problem that we interpret the verses of the holy books by ourselves although most of these verses came at special situations for any religion to defend themselves against the disbelievers who fight them. The special situation in any holy book must not be applied as a general rule and applied in all conditions. God did not encourage any prophet to kill the others but He encouraged them to spread the religion and the word of God and at the same time to only fight who fight them.

One of the rules of interpreting the verses of any holy book is to study all the verses of the book because the verses complete each other and do not take one verse as a guide to make a law from it. This is the theology and any law must not be taken from one verse in any holy book.

God said in holy Quran
(7) God does not forbid you to deal justly and kindly with those who fought not against you on account of religion nor drove you out of your homes. Verily, you should show them kindness and deal justly with them. Lo! God loves the just dealers and God loves those who deal with equity. (8) It is only as regards those who fought against you on account of religion, and have driven you out of your homes, and helped to drive you out, that Allâh forbids you to befriend them. And whosoever will befriend them, then such are the Zâlimûn (wrong-doers those who disobey Allâh). (9)

This is a rule in all religions; Islam, Christianity and Judaism.
hi,ali!
i like your discussion,and,i agree,there is just ONE GOD,and,because he gave us free will,we can not handle that!GOD respect us,so should we =respect eachother!
Well, once again, I think that the point being made here is that it is not the religion that dictates anger and fighting, but individuals using their faith as an excuse for what they want to do. I hesitate to paint any faith with a broad, damning brush, as there are tenets of peace and brother- or sisterhood in all of them. They might be interpreted as condoning fighting, but reading more than one passage, as Ali recommends, leads one to realize that the intent is not to encourage a descent into the baser human drives, but to raise the congregation above the baser human drives. Humanity may be basically good, but there are certainly parts of us that I would like to ask people to inspect within themselves.
Religions once served a purpose on this planet-to keep people held to a faith of believing and loving the many aspects of
God under different names. But humanity feels the need to deitize the Teachers who have come here---Mohammed, Krishna, Buddha, Yeshua Ben Joseph (Jesus). They did not come to be worshipped-they came to teach man of the fundamental Laws of the Universe, including Love in its highest form, which is the energy of what we call God. As we mature on all levels of our being, we realize there is no need of "religion"...we are spiritual beings. To reach a level of Christ-consciousness is to be a thinking, living, fully God-filled aspect of God energy. As we place our thoughts toward this-so shall it be.
With Love to All,
Victoria
Dear Victoria,
No one Muslim deify Mohamed or Jesus or any other prophet.

RSS

Latest Activity

Lucy Williams updated their profile
Jul 5, 2023
Sandra Gutierrez Alvez updated their profile
Oct 1, 2022
DallasBoardley updated their profile
Feb 8, 2022
RADIOAPOLLON1242 AIGOKEROS PANOS updated their profile
Feb 2, 2022
Shefqet Avdush Emini updated their profile
Jul 2, 2021
Ralph Corbin updated their profile
Jun 25, 2021
Marques De Valia updated their profile
Mar 24, 2021
SSEAYP - South-East Asian Youth liked David Califa's discussion Flash Banners Here
Feb 29, 2020

© 2024   Created by David Califa. Managed by Eyal Raviv.   Powered by

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service