maracus,
We sound a little touchy...perhaps a little blustery - hard to say, but I guess you're not smiling:)

Nice post Boazy.

relda/David
Thou shalt not kill, love thy neighbour, conservatism is conservatism.

SHONGA,
"Thou shalt not kill" and "Love thy neighbour etc.” are bound together with eight other commands by the same ‘authority’. I’d presume you give them ALL equal preference – or, do you pick and choose?... I’d suggest you would be rather conservative.

I've read all the comments about the article, but what I want to say is about the book itself. It gave me a lot to think about. That's what I like: to have something to discuss with others. I don't think we have to come to hard and fast conclusions about being a peace activist or not. We just need to talk things over, perhaps changing our minds every time we talk to someone else. Kurlansky's point might simply be that while we're talking to each other we don't have much of an inclination to go to war. Is that too simplistic for some?

The way I see it, To pretend war is never necessary is bad.
To concede it is inevitable is worse.

Boaz: I hear your points about warfare, and cede they have merit.
At the same time, I can't help but feel they sound much more militant than the 'turn the other cheek' rhetoric of Jesus Christ.

If we don't attempt to stop violence, then we are desensitising ourselves to it.
Whenever we say - oh well, war happens, then we make it legitimate.

The real question here, is at what stage do you decide to go to war. What makes a war justified?

Discounting the economic rationales, the political reasons for this war have been dubious.
If this war was waged on the humanitarian grounds that are now being spruiked, then Darfur would have been a much more logical choice, and it wouldn't have the associated risk of alienating the muslim world.

But it wasn't chosen. Iraq was. I can only conclude that this humanitarian reason has been fabricated to suit other purposes - the economic ones.

Economic reasons are not moral; by their very nature they are about self interest - not even self defence. Last I checked, jesus wasn't keen on that.

Boaz: you are justified in portraying the peace at all costs advocates as being unrealistic, however your statement: "Advocating Peace" is just shallow, misguided and stupid" is wrong.

Not everybody want peace. Many people want money and are willing to fight for it.

To not speak out against these activities... somehow I don't think jesus would've been cool with that.

Tell me David... Do you really think jesus would have been okay with the Iraq war?

It's difficult to see how this article can be turned on its head as it has here. There isn't much to argue about when someone says we should all be nice to one another. TurnRight you seem to have a better handle on this than most.

If "Advocating Peace" is just shallow, misguided and stupid, I'm totally at a loss to understand what it takes to be clever. DB you seem to know the bible better than most. Why not read to us some of the good bits?