Bosk

I’m very familiar with Psalm 137.

You understand the context in which it was written. Judah was invaded by the Babylonians and many taken into exile back to Babylon. The Jewish nation was in ruins, it must have been desperate times. If you and your family were subjugated I wonder what you would have written.

(As it happened there was a miracle of sorts, King Cyrus of Persia defeated Babylon and was told in a dream to return the Jewish exiles back to their homeland and were allowed to worship their God, the God of one being with Jesus)

The interesting thing about Jewish and Christian scripture is that we’re not ordered to commit intellectual suicide we can contextualize the Bible. As the world changes and our understanding changes the Bible changes. We can see things that earlier generations can’t. The Old Testament is a record of the interaction between God and His chosen people, that has relevance for everyone.

Islamic scripture is very different, it was supposed to have been dictated by the Angel Gabriel to Mohammed. There can be no historical context. God wasn’t working through his imperfect children. Humans were by-passed in the Qu’ran. Muslims believe a copy of the Qur’an resides in Heaven. The following link scroll to

“When even the Pope has to whisper”

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/others/spengler.html

explains what I mean. And explains why what you think is a salient point is not.

Islam is a kind of religion that you have no idea of. I urge you to have a closer look. You believe you’re being the epitome of common sense and calm rationality but you’re sadly mistaken. Many are past that point with regard to Islam.

The closer you look the more glaring the difference between Judaism/Christianity and this Islam.

Martin
3 points
1) God working through a falible human being is exactly the same as an angel working through a fallible Muhammed. Quite weird to claim there is any difference!

2) Infanticide is evil. Always was, always will be. For someone to declare that God will bless a jew if he dashes a baby's head out is NOT an example of God working through a falible human being. It is an example of hatred. But hold on a minute. If one of the many writers of the bible could confuse hatred with the voice of God then perhaps there are other mistakes in there.

3) I have a degree in ancient history & am quite aware of the historical context of these events. However your knowledge of the culture of the times seem sorely lacking. For example you wrote in a previous post that Christianity is a historical faith. But history as you understand it is a concept of Greek origin. The people of the Middle East in the 1st Century & before cared only to explain their god's actions in the world. Therefore if they had to change some facts in order to better explain that central truth they would quite happily do that. Not exactly history as you would understand it is it Martin?
What does that mean? Basicly that some of the events & versus unpon which christian doctrines are based may not be accurate. So perhaps you should actually check all the facts & NOT just those that agree with you. For a start I can recommend a very good book "Joshua, the Man They Called Jesus" by Ian Jones. You might also check out the link I provided two posts ago

Ah Numbat! Now you are sounding like one of those fathers who claim: This is no son of mine! And write their son out of the will. ;)

It doesn't change the fact that Islam adopted the fundamentals of how Christianity spread and grew and some of its tenets and that Islam pays its own form of 'respect' to the Christian religion. Mohammed was obviously impressed with the way Christianity grew and he was very clever at picking the parts of Christianity that made it such a successful vehicle for taking over the world. Now Islam is the second largest religion in the world and is growing at the rate of 2.13% per year compared to Christianity's 1.39%.

The Jews felt the same way about the Christians. Christianity was originally a Jewish Sect that evolved to a point where it believed in things that were not within the Jewish fold. The Jews were irate - they kicked the christians out (who until then had worshipped with them in their synagogues) and cried as you have, Numbat, 'this is no son of mine!'

The Christians claimed to respect the Jewish Religion that it grew out of - Heck, the Jewish Old Testament is the largest part of the the Bible. But if Christianity was honest with itself it would admit that it RADICALLY changed the Jewish Faith. It borrowed what it wanted and changed what it didn't like until the Son was no longer recognised by his father and was flung out.

And then the Christians for centuries persecuted their 'father', torturing, killing and marginalising.

But the Jews had a similar fate. The Jews are not the whole sum of the children of Israel. They are the descendents of the tribe of Judah, only one of the twelve tribes of Israel (although it absorbed the remnant of the tribe of Benjamin after the Israelites massacred most of them). So what happened to the other ten tribes? You would have heard of the Samaritans through the parable in the NT. cont...

The Samaritans that are mentioned in the NT claim to be descended from the other tribes. They have their own version of religion similar to Judaism. They believe that the tribe of Judah was part of an early breakaway from the 'true faith'.

In the Bible, God gave the tribe of Levi a monopoly on the priesthood and yet they are one of the tribes of the Samaritans not the Jews.

They bemoan the breakaway and pollution of the original religion by the Jews "You are no son of mine!"

Then the Jews for centuries persecuted their 'father', torturing, killing and marginalising.

And what about the Johanites, the followers of John the Baptist I mentioned in a previous post? And what of the Shiite Ashura?

There are so many examples!

So why do these Middle Eastern Religions kick out their sons? There is an easy answer to that-they are intolerant of change and children always want to change things.

Numbat-where did you get your knowledge of Paganism? Paganism is not a religion-it is the whole range of religions that stand outside the Religions of the Book (ie Jewish, Chrisitan, Islam). That is a heck of a lot of religions. I think you should be more specific about just what you are berrating.

Martin's link doesn't make sense. The Dei Verbum states: 'The books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted' But Father Fessio in the article states 'Christianity's Gospels, by the same token, are the reports of human evangelists' as opposed to the Prophet Mohammed who claims that it was directly from God though the Archangel Gabriel.

Either the Gospel is the word of God or its the words of the human evangelists. Father Fessio is outside Church Doctrine, and out of line.

Ah Aziliz: Now you are sounding like one who claims an inheritance that he is not entitled to.
mohamad -the pedophile, by our standards - used parts of the Bible and the parts he used he completely altered. Why? to fit in with him being a descendant of Ishmael. So in his false, blasphemous koran Ishmael gets all the blessings. Must get up moslems noses to read that Israel is the 'Apple of God's eye'
Christianity was seen by some as a Jewish sect but it was not. Admittedly the so-called Christian religion came out of Christianity but they are different.
No Christianity DID NOT! change the Jewish faith PLEASE read this slowly - Christianity was a new faith it's a faith that was taught by Christ Jesus and then Apostles.
Sadly to our shame we did persecute the Jews
Many of the northern kingdom fled to Judea others were captured and they have disappeared. The Samaritans were bought into Israel which was empty and they claimed to be Israelites.
2nd. post: Levites are not never have been Samaritans.
A pagan is one who worships false gods - moslems, buddhists, hindus, animists, satanists, atheists [yes I know they worship no god at all] etc. numbat

Fellow_Human says:

“I will never understand your mob. “

I don’t think you could – to understand is to “question” and examine the answers.

Questioning your own Qur’an is anathema in Islam. You believe it was dictated from Allah to your prophet from a hard copy (stone) in heaven (wherever that is to you).

What mohammad recited was therefore “holy”; recited verbatim and applied without understanding or interpretation.

Yes you have other books to explain it all but this is just because the original assemblage of texts did not make much sense.

How would it make sense? Coming from an Arabic nomad (not a Jew) who is unrelated to Abraham except through a foolish moment of weakness when he married his Egyptian servant, conceiving Ismail (Ishmael). No direct link to mohammad could ever be supported.

God’s (not allah) plan for humanity was given to the Jews. Never did God consider Ishmael as an Israelite: therefore no enheritance promised. (Sorry guys).

Mohammad learned these facts the hard way when he migrated to Madinah after being kicked out from his home town. Jews made fun of him when he (an arab) presented himself as a prophet from their God (Yahweh).

Hell broke lose – his hatred of the Jews and Christians (apparent in the Qur’an) became the tenor of his subsequent "prophetic career” until his death.

I bet you knew all that heh? But that is not the part that could get you too many customers.

This hatred is what we see today from the followers of this deranged person. The majority are illiterate and just follow their enlightened leaders and provocators.

So to say that Islam is an offshoot of Christianity is wrong.

Islam is a faction that grew beyond what their founder initially imagined. His interest grew from a Jesus’ envy that was not to be recognised EXCEPT by force and brutality.

Today islam is grossly mistaken as a "religion" because of its sheer number of muslem born adherents. But to link it to a divine - let alone Abrahamic - religion is blasphemous to say the least.