Dear Fractelle.. I'll do that :) bear with me.

"You cannot use the Bible to prove the bible"

is both correct and false. You can use ANY document as evidence. You can use 'Witness statements' in a court of law. We learn much of history from 'documents'. The assumption behind the statement "you cannot use/to prove" Is that ALL statements made are dogmatic in origin rather than factual and historical. We have Justice Micheal Kirby of the high court making a contribution to OLO.. I venture to suggest that even he, with his personal proclivities as they are, would describe such a view as 'absurd'.

Only those unfamiliar with the documents, their broad scope of personal journal style and doctrinal explaination would say such an untenable thing.

A witness who says "You can believe me, because I always speak the truth" is self condemning..yes. But a witness who offers a view, which is supported/corroborated by a number of views, allows the possibility of cross examination and comparison. This fact seems to escape some of our more 'enlightened' posters :)

FRANK.. now that you have found the truth (at last) why is it that you are in some kind of time warp denial thing about Islam, Mohammad and his behavior/followers etc ? Thats all I present you know..I find no value in the heated emotional opinions of 'muslim haters' who rely more on spiced up adjectives than solid truth.
I don't try to persuade a Sunni of the error of his ways by using Shia documents or vice versa. That would be like coming to an evangelical Christian and using the Jehovah Witness version of the Bible to prove Jesus was 'just a man'.

Martin, this quote might need a little more context:

>>Even Gert Lüdemann, the leading German critic of the resurrection, himself admits, “It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.”<<

Did Gerd make this observation before, or after, his "provocative hypothesis that early Christian belief in Jesus' resurrection was the product of hallucinatory experiences originally induced by guilt-complexes in Peter and Paul" (Dr William Craig)

And you are more than a little out of line with your accusation

>>you finish with the astounding claim that truth doesn’t matter, that arguing for the rational grounds of Christianity, which Boaz does, by default fosters hatred!<<

It is not the "rational grounds of Christianity" that foster hatred, Martin, but his constant, mindless denigration of Islam.

And Boaz - ah, Boaz.

>>That's strange.. I thought you had read Acts. 2 mentions of Pauls conversion experience, and then there is his own testimony in Galatians 1:11-12<<

The problem here is that you contend that Paul's "conversion experience" equates with a physical meeting. Hi, Paul, how's it going? Not bad thanks Jesus, the eyes are fine now.

If this hallucination is at the base of the claim that upwards of 500 people "met" the resurrected Jesus, then it is certainly open to some question, no?

>>Pericles, you criticize my method, but what better method of understanding either Islam or Christianity than looking at what the founder said<<

Fine by me. But all you have to support your view of Christianity is not "what the founder said", merely what a bunch of vested interests would have you believe that he said.

There is no, repeat no, contemporary evidence that supports your theory, except for the carefully selected writings of people with a strong incentive to write what they did.

>>But a witness who offers a view, which is supported/corroborated by a number of views...<<

This is a little bit like claiming that because Martin Ibn Warriq agrees with what you write, it must be true.

I don't think so.

Dear All,

First of all I would like to thank steventmeyer, relda, VK3AUU and goodthief for their kind words.

Its been a while since I’ve been on Online Opinion, but somethings don’t change – CJMorgan is where he was last time I met him. BOAZ_David and Pericles still at it hammer and tongs (I can only say they must love one another), and like Ginx I was surprised by the number of articles written by “God-y types” as she puts it. Sorry if you are a “he” Ginx but I got the feeling you are a “she”.

I have another essay in the pipeline on “Legislating Morality?”(and looking forward to meeting up with Don Aitkin, Yabby, aqvarivs, especially Celivia and the rest of the gang from last year when we slugged it out on abortion). Perhaps I should allow OLO to post more non religious essays – trouble is so many of them are so damn boring, so much motherhood, pretentious stuff. Part of the reason for my absence is that I’ve been working my way through all the new atheists and might have something to say on that depressing subject as well.

I suppose everyone has caught up with the fact that yesterday the Vatican announced that the Pope has Muslims coming to the Vatican for a confab in November – good thing too because if anyone is going to stand up for Christianity and beleaguered Christians (and persons of other faiths) in the Muslim world, then the current Pope is the person for the job. And hey, good opportunity for Muslims to put their side too.

Like CJ Morgan, I am disappointed to see no recognisably Muslim contribution on this thread, but maybe it’s early days.

Pericles, thank you for posting the link to acommonword.org.

Continued.....

However, Pericles why do you object to Christians and Muslims proselytising - secularists of all descriptions do it all the time? If Hitchens, Dawkins et al are not proselytising for their own ugly brand of atheism, then I don’t know what they’re up to. We are all in our own way proselytising for our own point of view whether or not it is tied to some holy book or assured finding of modern science or prejudice for that matter.

I do agree with your comment that we do need to accept the necessity of living side by side, if only because the way the world is shrinking. Whilst I have serious reservations about what can be achieved, genuine dialogue between Muslims and Christians (I would also like to see Jews included as well) is vital provided both sides set aside political correctness and speak truthfully, without fear or favour. Where I think you go wrong as noted by one of the other contributors is in thinking religion can be taken out of the discussion. You provided the link to A Common Way and therefore if you have read the document you will know it is a profoundly religious document. Religion lies close to the centre of all things. Even if we wish to deny that as a fact, we can’t help ourselves arguing about it, can we, Pericles?

CJ Morgan - loved all your quotes from the Bible – thought I was reading Hitchens et al again, you even made the NT sound scary. I fully endorse Martin Ibn Warriq’s response to you on this one

(PS Ibn, how do you get a name like that, do I detect some plagiarism? Ibn Warraq perhaps?).

Et tu David Palmer

>>Pericles why do you object to Christians and Muslims proselytising<<

I don't. I have absolutely no objection to proselytising per se, so long as it doesn't frighten the horses.

But what I did object to is the sleight of hand with which you concatenate the concepts of worship and proselytising...

>>the right of both Muslims and Christians anywhere to worship freely and to proselytise<<

These are two distinctly different acts, as you well know, and it smacks of deceit to pretend that the "rights" involved are identical. It is a bit like pretending that the right to bear arms and to shoot at people are one and the same.

>>If Hitchens, Dawkins et al are not proselytising for their own ugly brand of atheism, then I don’t know what they’re up to<<

It would be absolutely appropriate to include these folk in any ban on proselytising. However, I suspect that if religious folk were to confine themselves to worship, and refrained from ramming their version of the truth down everyone's gullet, the world would be such a calm and mild place that you wouldn't hear a peep out of the atheists either. There would be absolutely nothing for them to rail against.

>>Where I think you go wrong as noted by one of the other contributors is in thinking religion can be taken out of the discussion<<

Fair comment. But unless you are able to get past this barrier of "I'm right, he's wrong", there will never be any kind of progress. If you insist on reading “A Common Word” as a challenge to your faith - as it seems many other Christians have done - nothing will be achieved.

chrisse even posted the site where you guys can go to get a pre-packaged response http://islammonitor.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1199&Itemid=88

This is where you go to have someone else do your thinking for you. It tells you how to “interpret” the letter, and instructs you to respond in a particular way.

Unfortunately, the interpretation is heavily prejudiced, and laced with contempt. Hardly constructive.

Pericles - I think I'm in love

You said:

"However, I suspect that if religious folk were to confine themselves to worship, and refrained from ramming their version of the truth down everyone's gullet, the world would be such a calm and mild place that you wouldn't hear a peep out of the atheists either. There would be absolutely nothing for them to rail against."

Spot on. It is this 'holier than thou' attitude that really gets me annoyed. I keep saying live and let live, but no, there is this constant badgering on and on.

Really Palmer, Warriq, mjpb, Boaz et al; if you are so sure of your faith why do you keep on having to tell the rest of us all the time? A touch of the Lady Macbeths there you know.

As I have said before I resent the implication that, as an atheist, I am somehow morally reprehensible and need 'saving'. Just leave us to enjoy the world as we do, as we rejoice in the expansion of scientific discovery and stop trying to control everything, please.

You will never find common ground with your close cousins, the Muslims, until you can be a little bit more humble. Nothing to be ashamed of; being humble. I think there may have been a man who thought that treating others as you would like others to treat you was a very enlightened way to live. Who was that man?