Is Christianity more Murderous than Islam?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Joe on June 3, 2012 at 9:37

OK, I thought perhaps your remarks were throwaway, but now it seems you really want to stand by your claim that christianity has been hundreds of times more murderous than islam.  Your remarks about islam being quiescent during the 2nd & 3rd jihads implies you think that modern day christian nations are in a temporary lull from their love of murder and violence.

I am not going to argue scripture with you, or what christians believe the role of violence should be.  I'll leave that for others here who know about christianity.  But if that one allusive passage on Ananias and Sapphira is the best you can find for evidence of Jesus being murderous, it does not stand comparison with Ibn Ishaq's reports of Mohammed cutting off the heads of 700 jews and selling their wives and children into slavery.  Or perhaps you know of some analysis of the New Testament that shows how much of it is about hate and war.  Textual analysis of the core texts of islam show that 30% of the texts are about war, and that even 9% of the Koran is about war. http://4freedoms.ning.com/group/theology/forum/topics/textual-analy...

What I challenge you to do is to provide evidence that in the 300 years following the death of Jesus, that christians exhibited the same rapacious, murderous actions as muslims did in the 300 years following his death.  If you can't establish that, then I put it to you that christianity was used and subverted by the Roman Empire.  There was no external organisation that took the writings of Mohammed and subverted them.  Mohammed was at the front of his army.  In their case, it is a lie.  Why would you promote their lies?

Whether or not christians and jews worship the same god, I don't know.  Jews don't recognise Jesus as an essential part of that god, but christians do.  Muslims also do not believe that Jesus was a part of that god.  Christians say that the New Testament came to modify the Old Testament, and the New Testament is about love not violence.  And that is evidenced by the life of Jesus and by the acts of early christians (as far as I know).  Christians thus acknowledge the Old Testament.  But so do muslims.  Muslims claim that they are in the same line of religion as the Old Testament and the New Testament, but that Mohammed has come to terminate the chain of prophets.  And whilst Jesus was about love, Mohammed was about conquest.  Which "prophecy" is going to inspire armies of warriors and slave-mongers?  Both "prophets" have the Old Testament as their background; one of them promotes peace, the other promotes war.  Yet still you want to claim that christianity is more murderous than islam, despite the New Testament preaching peace and forgiveness, and the islamic testaments preaching war.  Which addition to the Old Testament is moderating it?  Which addition is returning to it?

You can see here the list of people murdered by Mohammed. http://4freedoms.ning.com/group/heritage/forum/topics/list-of-killi...  Can you find something similar about Jesus?  You claim that there was enough killing and violence in the Old Testament to justify murders, then why did they not happen in the centuries following the death of Jesus, yet they followed in the centuries after Mohammed's death.

You admit that the christian world never reconquered the lands taken from them and forcibly converted to islam, because muslims were more violent.  Yet you want to maintain the hyperbole that the blood spilt by muslims was but a drop in the bucket compared to that spilt by christians.  

I think you have no evidence for your claim that christianity is more violent than islam.  I think you have no evidence of it in fact, and no evidence for it in scripture.

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 3, 2012 at 11:36

Joe,

"What is missing from this history is context."

"Murder in the name of christianity comes from incorporation of christianity into religions of state,"...

It's interesting that you give the same apologetic that the Islamic fundamentalists give for the Islamic conquest. You know, it wasn't really us... it was those darn political rulers!  

"And if christianity (even as it has been exploited by rulers) was so violent and aggressive, why is it that half of the christian world was lost to islam, and those christian rulers have never used violence to reclaim  those loses (except for Spain & Portugal)?"

Islam here was the better at violence, that's why. 

"The page cited by Brother Mark refers to cases where up to 1 million people were killed in specific events, by the edict of those claiming to follow christianity.  Yet clearly they had usurped christianity, and their actions were going against the teachings of Jesus."  

"Whilst the rulers of christian empires went against christianity in order to massacre and dominate,"...

"And even if the killings in the name of christianity did outnumber those killed in the name of islam, such actions would have been against the teaching of Jesus, whilst they would have been in accordance with the teachings of Mohammed."

The New Testament book of Acts Ch.5 tells the story of how a husband and wife were murdered for selling some land and then not coughing it all up to peter when they lied about how much they got for it. Who murdered them? It was none other than the precious "holy" spirit of Jesus. Shame on them for lying!

⁹ Peter said to her, “How could you conspire to test the Spirit of the Lord? Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.” ¹⁰ At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. ¹¹ Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts+5&version=NIV

Take a look at some modern day Christian commentary on this...

"This chilling account of the sudden deaths of Ananias (Hebrew, "the Lord is gracious") and Sapphira (Aramaic, "beautiful") makes us face the fact that God deals with sin, especially church members' deceit and lack of integrity"...

"Such discipline certainly has its deterrent value."  http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/commentaries/IVP-NT/Acts/Nega...  

Although Jesus had some very good things to say, the God that they worship is no different than the vengeful, rath filled God of the Old Testament.

Murdering someone for lying? Would anyone care to deny that the best teacher teaches by example? To say that there are conflicting messages in the New Testament as well as the Bible itself, I believe would be fair....don't you?

 This is good piece that you may wish to read:

This discusses the similarities between the Qur'an and Judeo Christian scripture.

I also have found great similarities between the book of Deuteronomy and the teachings of Islam. Just where pray tell do you think the Muslim prophet Muhammad got many of his ideas from?

http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Parallelism_Between_the_Qur%27an_and_Jude...

Any Christian will acknowledge that the Christian Bible consists of both Old and New Testament, and claim that God is the same God as was is , is now, and shall be. Considering this, and taking the Christian Bible as a whole, there is certainly more to be used to justify the killing of those deemed "un Godly" than others would rather acknowledge.

Have you forgotten about their "witch" hunting, the murdering of heretics (the Christian form of Islam's "apostate"),  or the slaughter of indigenous peoples, just to name a few other examples,  all in the name and for the sake of their Christian God? 

Would you deny that given both their history and scripture, that they at least have great potential for unjust persecution and violence?

With metta,

Brother Mark:)

Joe said:

OK, I thought perhaps your remarks were throwaway, but now it seems you really want to stand by your claim that christianity has been hundreds of times more murderous than islam.  Your remarks about islam being quiescent during the 2nd & 3rd jihads implies you think that modern day christian nations are in a temporary lull from their love of murder and violence. ...

Permalink Reply by Joe on June 3, 2012 at 11:38

"Would you deny that given both their history and scripture, that they at least have great potential for unjust persecution and violence?"

That statement is a long way from your claim that the blood spilt by islam is a drop in the bucket of the blood spilt by christianity.  You don't seem to be prepared to admit that you were wrong, yet you don't provide any of the evidence I asked you to provide.

Buddhism, christianity and islam all have potential for unjust persecution and violence.  Water has the potential to kill. But it isn't classed as a weapon.

Again, you want to collapse scripture and subsequent history together, because that suits your purpose.  Of course I deny that on the basis of scripture christianity has the same potential for violence and persecution as islam.  No muslim has ever been able to provide me with texts from the New Testament which justify murder.  You can insist (as muslims do) that christianity and islam share the same roots; but the point is exactly as I've been laying out - christianity is a moderating voice against that Old Testament background; islam is a war-mongering voice against that Old Testament background.  It is no surprise when a war-mongering voice leads to war. It is a surprise when a doctrine of peace and love leads to war.  You want to claim christianity is violent because it holds onto the Old Testament; but you seem to ignore that islam also holds onto the Old Testament, and then bolsters it with yet more calls for violence.  And you are the one who has put forward the claim that christianity is far worse than islam when it comes to murder. 

Now when we look at the history as given in the list of "christian atrocities" you cited, there is nothing before the incorporation of christianity into the Roman Empire.  That history would appear to be totally at odds with the comparable history of islam.  Just like you think that the life of buddha and Theravaden Buddhism is the originary buddhism, so we can look at the lives of Jesus and Mohammed, and the initial followers of their religion as the undistorted representations of those religions.

Now, having answered your question, can you do me the courtesy of answering the questions I posed to you.

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 3, 2012 at 11:42

 Joe,

"What I challenge you to do is to provide evidence that in the 300 years following the death of Jesus, that christians exhibited the same rapacious, murderous actions as muslims did in the 300 years following his death."

The Christians didn't have the power to do so until a later period. The Muslim established their empire much sooner. Once they had it, it the slaughter began. 

"Whether or not christians and jews worship the same god, I don't know.  Jews don't recognise Jesus as an essential part of that god, but christians do.  Muslims also do not believe that Jesus was a part of that god." 

You seem to be forgetting here that both the Christian and the Muslim profess to worship the same God of the Old Testament. That's their "God the father", and what a great example that he set for all of us!

Once again...

 This is good piece that you may wish to read:

I also have found great similarities between the book of Deuteronomy and the teachings of Islam. Just where pray tell do you think the Muslim prophet Muhammad got many of his ideas from?

http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Parallelism_Between_the_Qur%27an_and_Jude...

Any Christian will acknowledge that the Christian Bible consists of both Old and New Testament, and claim that God is the same God as was is , is now, and shall be. Considering this, and taking the Christian Bible as a whole, there is certainly more to be used to justify the killing of those deemed "un Godly" than others would rather acknowledge.

Have you forgotten about their "witch" hunting, the murdering of heretics (the Christian form of Islam's "apostate"),  or the slaughter of indigenous peoples, just to name a few other examples,  all in the name and for the sake of their Christian God? 

"For anyone to just say "well,heh, you know I don't think that Jesus would have actually done that" just doesn't cut it.

Will you answer the question that I've asked?

Would you deny that given both their history and scripture, that they at least have great potential for unjust persecution and violence?

With metta,

 

Brother Mark:)

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 3, 2012 at 13:46

Joe,

 

Which addition to the Old Testament is moderating it?

There is none that I can tell, that would be like asking where in the Qur'an is the scriptural moderation for the comparative quietude between the second and third Jihad.

 Which addition is returning to it?

The Book of Deuteronomy (among others) would be a god place to start.

"That statement is a long way from your claim that the blood spilt by islam is a drop in the bucket of the blood spilt by christianity.  You don't seem to be prepared to admit that you were wrong, yet you don't provide any of the evidence I asked you to provide."

"What I challenge you to do is to provide evidence that in the 300 years following the death of Jesus, that christians exhibited the same rapacious, murderous actions as muslims did in the 300 years following his death."

"Now when we look at the history as given in the list of "christian atrocities" you cited, there is nothing before the incorporation of christianity into the Roman Empire.  That history would appear to be totally at odds with the comparable history of islam."

Once again,...

The Christians didn't have the power to do so until a later period. The Muslim established their empire much sooner. Once they had it, it the slaughter began. 

Once they had it the slaughter began.....Once they had it the slaughter began.....

 "You want to claim christianity is violent because it holds onto the Old Testament; but you seem to ignore that islam also holds onto the Old Testament, and then bolsters it with yet more calls for violence."

No, what I'm saying is that Christianity has great violent potential that it has already demonstrated. 

 I put it to you that christianity was used and subverted by the Roman Empire.

Again, This is the same type of story handed to us by the Islamic fundamentalists and their apologists regarding the Islamic conquest, I don't buy it from them and I'm not purchasing it from you either.

 "Now when we look at the history as given in the list of "christian atrocities" you cited,"...

You put Christian atrocity's here in quotation marks, are you denying that this is what they should be called? It would seem so.

Exodus 15:3

³ The Lord is a warrior; 
    the Lord is his name.

 Deuteronomy 20:10

 ¹⁰ When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. ¹¹ If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. ¹² If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. ¹³ When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. ¹⁴ As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies. ¹⁵ This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.

¹⁶ However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. ¹⁷ Completely destroy them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—as the Lord your God has commanded you. ¹⁸ Otherwise, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshiping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God.

I do hope you understand that this is the common father of both Islam and Christianity talking. Yes, all religions are capable of unjust persecution and violence theoretically but due to their scripture some are more capable than others. In the reference that I gave you as an example, (where you don't seem to think that these were real atrocities) the murdering of Native American's in masse by the Christian's was something justified with a quoting from the Book of Deuteronomy.

I am unaware of any Buddhist scripture that would come anywhere near close to any of this. There is no Buddhist scripture that condones the killing of any living creature for any reason.

You don't seem to acknowledge that the atrocity's cited are real atrocities, and so therefore how could someone claim that the Christians have historically speaking spilt far more blood?

Unbelievable.

Wishing you the spiritual best!

 

Brother Mark:)

 

Joe said:

"Would you deny that given both their history and scripture, that they at least have great potential for unjust persecution and violence?"

That statement is a long way from your claim that the blood spilt by islam is a drop in the bucket of the blood spilt by christianity.  You don't seem to be prepared to admit that you were wrong, yet you don't provide any of the evidence I asked you to provide.

Buddhism, christianity and islam all have potential for unjust persecution and violence.  Water has the potential to kill. But it isn't classed as a weapon.

Again, you want to collapse scripture and subsequent history together, because that suits your purpose.  Of course I deny that on the basis of scripture christianity has the same potential for violence and persecution as islam.  No muslim has ever been able to provide me with texts from the New Testament which justify murder.  You can insist (as muslims do) that christianity and islam share the same roots; but the point is exactly as I've been laying out - christianity is a moderating voice against that Old Testament background; islam is a war-mongering voice against that Old Testament background.  It is no surprise when a war-mongering voice leads to war. It is a surprise when a doctrine of peace and love leads to war.  You want to claim christianity is violent because it holds onto the Old Testament; but you seem to ignore that islam also holds onto the Old Testament, and then bolsters it with yet more calls for violence.  And you are the one who has put forward the claim that christianity is far worse than islam when it comes to murder. 

Now when we look at the history as given in the list of "christian atrocities" you cited, there is nothing before the incorporation of christianity into the Roman Empire.  That history would appear to be totally at odds with the comparable history of islam.  Just like you think that the life of buddha and Theravaden Buddhism is the originary buddhism, so we can look at the lives of Jesus and Mohammed, and the initial followers of their religion as the undistorted representations of those religions.

Now, having answered your question, can you do me the courtesy of answering the questions I posed to you.

Permalink Reply by John Carlson on June 3, 2012 at 13:57

The problem with this view is that Christianity is not just a religion of the New Testament. There have been fringe sects over the ages which threw out the Old Testament, most notably Marcionism, but the mainstream of Christianity has always (and still does) take the Old Testament as scripture. So limiting your Muslim interlocutors to the "New Testament only" isn't a fair comparison. It is only very recently that Christians stopped drawing from the Old Testament. To give just one example, the colonization of the US by the English was very much patterned on the Israelite's military conquest of Canaan. America was regarded as the promised land, and the American Indians were regarded as the Canaanites, which God would help the chosen people eliminate.
Furthermore, Jesus himself said, in Matthew 5:17-18: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." As a Jew, Jesus is using the "the Law or the Prophets" to refer to the Old Testament. He is saying that the New Testament does not, in any way, reject or supercede the Old Testament.
So it's really not fair to compare the Koran against the NT. The Koran of the Christians is the OT+NT.
 My advice to you is that: if you want to argue the merits of these books, you should read both of them first, very carefully.
Joe said:

No muslim has ever been able to provide me with texts from the New Testament which justify murder.

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 3, 2012 at 14:26

Joe,

When I was discussing the Muslim conquests also referred to as the  "Islamic conquests" this is what I was referring to:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_conquests

Yes, The Islamic apologists hand us the same type of story...this was the doing of the greedy people after Muhammad who were actually more interested in conquering land... "true" Islam had nothing to do with it because true" Islam was subverted by these people they tell us!

 

As I've said, I don't buy it from them nor anyone handing me the same story as an apologist for Christianity either. 

 

Brother Mark:)

Permalink Reply by paul collings on June 3, 2012 at 21:16

I do hope you understand that this is the common father of both Islam and Christianity talking. Yes, all religions are capable of unjust persecution and violence theoretically but due to their scripture some are more capable than others. In the reference that I gave you as an example, (where you don't seem to think that these were real atrocities) the murdering of Native American's in masse by the Christian's was something justified with a quoting from the Book of Deuteronomy.

Brother Mark,

Most historians accept that the largest percentage of native Americans died due to Disease. Smallpox being the biggest killer, Typhus,colera,whooping cough, and even bubonic plague also played a part.

The colonisation has never been linked to a march of christianity, rather it was a case of opportunists, promised the chance of great wealth that  took to the new world. Christianity was quite slow to catch up.

Unless you want to call the spread of Desease the work of God, and the greed of men a purely Christian trait i don't see how you can pin the colonisation of the Americas on the christians.  

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 3, 2012 at 23:41

 

Paul,

 

"Unless you want to call the spread of Desease the work of God, and the greed of men a purely Christian trait i don't see how you can pin the colonisation of the Americas on the christians."  

That's not what I was doing.

I was simply making a reference to a source of information that I provided Joe with earlier, where certain atrocities of Christianity were listed, and I was referring to a specific example.

 

Thanks though!

 

Brother Mark:)

Permalink Reply by paul collings on June 3, 2012 at 23:57

Are you going to accept it was a bad example then, as the death of the native americans can't be attributed to a christian atrocity.

Permalink Reply by John Carlson on June 4, 2012 at 1:24

Paul:

There were definitely strains of Christian justification (based on the Old Testament) for the conquest of the Americas, e.g.:

"The story of the conquest of Canaan is the most often used biblical foundation for the conquest of this continent. Juan Gines de Sepulveda [a prominent and influential Spanish philosopher of the 16th century] used this biblical theme to legitimate the war against its inhabitants...He justified the conquest in order to punish blasphemy, but also because the continent was a special donation by God, as the promised land (The Pope as Christ's vicar had the authority to give the lands.) God chose the Spanish to carry out this divine judgment against the infidels, and to conquer their lands. From this Sepulveda affirmed that such a war besides being licit, was necessary because of the gravity of the people's crimes."
http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/joshua/nativeam.html

The following article reviews sixteenth-and seventeenth-century writings by Rastell, More, Eden, Hakluyt, Peckham, Gray, Symonds, Johnson, Strachey, Purchas, Winthrop, and Cotton justifying English occupation of Indian lands through the Biblical Canaan analogy and the secular "vacant land" (vacuum domicilium) principle. Notes dissent by Crashaw, Williams, and others. Contains 95 references.
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1184402?uid=3738328&uid=2...

Permalink Reply by Mark on June 4, 2012 at 2:01

Joe,

A quick additional note here, although it can be said that there is a difference between what is considered "true" Islam and what some consider "true" Christianity, the point here is that both the Islamic conquest and the Roman empire were both after the time of  Muhammad and Jesus. The excuse given doesn't work well for either. Whom ever you're talking about, religion and an abundance of state power together doesn't work very well, especially when your working with the God exemplified by the "people of the book".    

Brother Mark:)

Mark said:

Joe,

When I was discussing the Muslim conquests also referred to as the  "Islamic conquests" this is what I was referring to:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_conquests

Yes, The Islamic apologists hand us the same type of story...this was the doing of the greedy people after Muhammad who were actually more interested in conquering land... "true" Islam had nothing to do with it because true" Islam was subverted by these people they tell us!

 

As I've said, I don't buy it from them nor anyone handing me the same story as an apologist for Christianity either. 

 

Brother Mark:)

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