Muslims vs. Archaeology
What is it about Islam that leads so many Muslims to see their cultural patrimony as something to be despised and even destroyed?
Harking back to the Taliban’s destruction of Afghanistan’s Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001, Muslims in northern Mali last week moved against their own country’s heritage. The Islamic supremacist group Ansar Dine (Defenders of the Religion) raised international concern when they began destroying some of the ancient shrines of Muslim saints in Timbuktu, “the city of 333 saints.” According to Ishaan Tharoor in Time magazine, “UNESCO, the UN’s cultural agency, says as many as half of the city’s shrines ‘have been destroyed in a display of fanaticism.’”
Why would a Muslim group destroy the tombs of Muslim holy men? “The destruction is a divine order,” an Ansar Dine spokesman explained; another added that they planned to destroy all the city’s ancient tombs, “without exception.”
UNESCO and the international media have portrayed Ansar Dine’s stance on this as unthinking fanaticism, contradicting Islam’s tenets: UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova declared that “the attack on Timbuktu’s cultural heritage is an attack against this history and the values it carries — values of tolerance, exchange and living together, which lie at the heart of Islam.”
Unfortunately for Bokova, however, Ansar Dine has ample support from within Islamic tradition for considering these shrines to be idolatrous, even though they commemorate Muslim heroes. According to a hadith attributed to Aisha, Muhammad’s favorite wife and notorious child bride, as Muhammad lay dying, “he drew his sheet upon his face and when he felt uneasy, he uncovered his face and said in that very state: Let there be curse upon the Jews and the Christians that they have taken the graves of their apostles as places of worship. He in fact warned (his men) against what they (the Jews and the Christians) did” (Sahih Muslim 1082).
Another tradition has the dying Muhammad saying, “Allah cursed the Jews and the Christians, for they built the places of worship at the graves of their prophets,” and Aisha adding: “And if that had not been the case, then the Prophet’s grave would have been made prominent before the people. So (the Prophet) was afraid, or the people were afraid that his grave might be taken as a place for worship” (Sahih Bukhari 2.23.472).
Muslims who consider the shrines of saints to be idolatrous reason from those traditions that if the grave of Muhammad himself was not to be taken as a place of worship, neither should the graves of lesser Muslims become shrines for prayer and pilgrimage. This is akin to the Islamic disdain for the pre-Islamic cultural patrimony of Muslim lands: any manifestation of idolatry, however artistically or culturally significant, is to be regarded with disdain at best.
Following Mo/allah, Muslims become brain dead and would not understand any reason, logic or their own pre-Islamic heritage as evidenced by actions of Muslims in Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Malaysia, Mali, etc, etc,. They call the period before Islam as jahiliyya(ignorance. But the fact is jahiliyya is brought upon the land once Islam comes there. Since they become brain dead, they can’t recogize this – ignorance is bliss!!
No doubt Muslims are in jahiliyya and will remain there as long as they follow Islam.
Perhaps it is incumbent upon the developed and somewhat rational world to obtain these treasures and put them in a safe museum in the US or Canada… at least until the muslims take over here and destroy them (cause our current President seems bent on making that happen).
Some artifacts can be saved from the ignorance of islam – but not all.
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/raymond-ibrahim/muslim-brotherhood-destroy-the-pyramids/
Who do the treasures of the past really belong to – the wider world, or the country of origin? And what happens when the country of origin decides to destroy them, for whatever reason? We kicked around this question a couple of months ago at Chicagoboyz -
http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/27027.html
We have also seen the fruit of this assumption in our own times in Cyprus, where Muslims attempted to use the fourth century monastery of San Makar as a hotel, and in Libya, where Qaddafi turned Tripoli’s Catholic cathedral into a mosque. And the most notorious recent example, of course, was the Taliban’s dynamiting of the Buddhas of Bamiyan.
And the Hagia Sophia of Nicea was just turned back into a mosque. A month or so ago, there was a massive “prayer rally” in front of the Hagia Sophia of Constantinople demanding IT be turned back into a mosque.
What you’re talking about goes back centuries. The Machpelah (tomb of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob ) in Hebron has been holy and a site of pilgrimage to Jews for eons. While the Arabs controlled the area not only did they convert it to a mosque they made it a capital offense for a non Muslim to go beyond the first few steps outside. Now their latest bit of nonsense in Israel not only are they driving the (Arab) Christians out of Bethlehem they’re claiming the church of the nativity as a mosque.
Was ever a greater calamity visited on a people that they should become Mohammedans, or have Mohammedans come upon them? To take just one example, the death toll from the Mughal invasion of India is estimated at 80-90 million people, and there are entire cities that have been so thoroughly effaced from the Earth that their existence can only be inferred. It should go without saying that these are not the actions of a confident culture but instead of a weak and timorous one. Unfortunately a billion people, be they ever so weak, can still wreak havoc. Think how much more pleasant a place the world would be had the infant Mohammed been strangled in his crib.
Indeed!! and the total world wide death toll of Islamic invasions is 270 to 300 millions. It was world’s misfortune that this is Mo/allah guy was born and somehow even survived the attempts by his own family members. The misery wreaked upon human beings of the world by him and his followers is simply unimaginable!!!
There was no Mohammed to strangle. He’s just an Obama style composite of Moses and Jesus, history and reason be damned.
I might note that the Library at Alexandria was destroyed by early Christians. In fact, religion in general is a fairly destructive force.
You might also note that, unlike Islam, Christianity has evolved, and is still evolving from the mindset that would call for the burning of the Library at Alexandria. You might further note that it was Christian abolitionists that led the drive to free the slaves in the United States.
The Library of Alexandria was first destroyed twice by Roman’s, with Christianity having no part in it. The Library was then protected for a time by the Cristian Roman empire. Then a pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church had the buildings that had housed the Library destroyed because they were pagan, but the books had most likely been removed before the destruction. Then, there is a story about a Muslim army destroying the Library in 642 A.D., but many scholars believe that story to have been made up by a later Islamist, to justify his own book burning/destroying. It wouldn’t surprise me if what’s left of the Library of Alexandria is still protected by the Vatican. I have met many Muslim people that do seem very peaceful, but it is a fact that the Islamist books can very easily be interpreted as a political movement based on violent conquest and forced conversion, whereas, the spread of Christianity was based more on word of mouth and voluntary conversion, instead of coercion. In my opinion, if it weren’t for the constant Islamist conquest of everything, at the time, there probably would never have been any Christian “Crusades”.
You are partly correct. When Ceaser took over Egypt, the fighting sparked a fire that partially destroyed the library. However, the Christians did destroy the books and library in later centuries.
Now, I am still laughing over the fact that conversion to Christianity was peaceful. You were joking? If not, note that the Romans killed maybe a few hundred Christians in the games. Then the Christians killed thousands of those that adhered to the old Romans religions. Any land entered by the Christians either converted or died. It is thought that the Viking raids to England were in response to the brutality of the Christians trying to convert them. Then we have the burnings, the Crusades, and the destruction of any other group that even questioned the “true” religion. Now, has it changed into a peaceful religion? Hardly, see what happens if you oppose any Christian creed.
“Now, has it changed into a peaceful religion? Hardly, see what happens if you oppose any Christian creed.”
Really? Tell you what. Next Christmas go and sue to have a creche removed from your local public space. You may win. The local Christers will probably talk bad about you. You may cry. Then hop on a flight to Syria. Hit the streets of Damascus and raise the awareness of the locals. Tell them how religion in general is a fairly destructive force. Do not forget to include Islam. After that you could give us a compare & contrast, except you’d be dead.
Except it’s not known for certain what happened to the library. But it sounds like you’ve made up your mind.
“It is thought that the Viking raids to England were in response to the brutality of the Christians trying to convert them.”
Who thinks that? No credible researcher I know of has ever said that.
The Norse went around raiding because it was where the money/loot was. Places like Lindisfarne was a target because it was easy pickings, not because they were Christian monks.
David, you seem to be a inexhaustible font of anti-Catholic/Christian cliches and propaganda. You may want to engage in a little mental housecleaning/hygiene by reading David Bentley Hart’s “Atheist Delusions,” which debunks each of the myths and half-truths you cite and more, B.S. which I had heard repeated so many times that I assumed they must be true. (And I’m not a Christian, if you’re inclined toward the knee-jerk response.) Jonah Goldberg’s new book (“Tyranny of Cliches”) also has a nice chapter on this topic. There may indeed be people who think that the Vikings were victims lashing out at Christian would-be oppressors, but those people would be idiots. I wouldn’t cite them as authority. Indeed, there seems to be no end to the nonsense spun out by anti-Catholic and anti-Christian bigots and propagandists, from the Enlightenment down to the present day.
One doesn’t need to use cliches or propaganda to debunk religion – facts do the job quite sufficiently. Religion, on the other hand, wrote the book on cliches and propaganda. Christians used the Bible just as much to justify slavery as they did to try to abolish it.
The only reason Christians aren’t still burning people at the stake is because of the triumph of rationality and science over superstition during the Enlightenment. The Muslims unfortunately missed out on that civilizing influence.
Looks like another one who could do with following Hub’s suggested reading. Or at least grab a dictionary and look up irony.
If shrines and holy places are looked down upon under islam, why was every inhabited place during the Gulf War and the Liberation of Iraq & Afghanistan referred to “As the Holy City of [fill in the blank]” during every news report?
Islam only looks down on non-Islamic sites. They are perfectly happy making their own, or, like Christianity did in the early days co-opt others for their own use.
That’s not quite accurate. The reason for the holy sites is that the local villagers are superstitious and still carry on the old traditions such as venerating the graves of holy men. These traditions are not tolerated by the hardliners.
“Islam only looks down on non-Islamic sites.”
Yes, they seem especially aggressive about taking over and destroying non-Islamic sites.
It goes back, in part, to the Torah/Biblical prohibitions against worshipping graven images, worshipping angels, or worshipping people, asheroth, altars on mountains to worship “strange gods”, consulting with ghosts or spirits… or any “lesser power”. Many Muslims refuse to mark the graves of their own dead family members.
But there is a significant difference between worshipping “strange” “lesser” “powers” and having a stone for gramps’ remains, a photo of grand-ma, a portrait of auntie Aelfgifu or St. Margaret, or of a rabbi/imam/priest simply as a memorial.
Perhaps the Timbuktu manuscripts should be stored near the Elgin marbles. I wonder what would have happened to the docuuments of the Cairo geniza if they were found in this century rather than last. Pity no one will burn the manuscripts stored at Al Azhar in Cairo.
Sooner or later, retaliation becomes a moral duty. When Muslim holy sites are destroyed, Muslims will have to face the fact that their sites need protection or vengeange proves that they are idols. If Muslims continue to worship idols, they will burn in hell.
http://oogenhand.wordpress.com/2012/07/10/avenge-the-pyramids-avenge-black-african-heritage/
By the way, what will Black activists and Afrocentrists think of the destruction of Black heritage?
You hit that one right on the head!
Why are so many blacks going to Islam when Islam declares that the past is blackness and should be destroyed. Blacks in America have no idea what they are getting into. Women are treated as animals and everyone who is not muslim is the enemy!
What will you do with all your black reletives who arent muslims?
And what will Muslims do to the Aztec and Maya pyramids? Do Hispanics think of that? What will the Mexica Movement and the Aztlan movement think of that?
“Why are so many blacks going to Islam…..”
I’ve always thought it appealed to their inner rage as much as anything else.
Bingo! Islam contains a way to justify most of the worst impulses of human nature if you do them in the name of Allah – murder, cheating, lying, stealing – all justifiable if you advance the cause of Islam. This is also why there are so many muslim converts in prison.
The pyramids are not going to survive until the end of this century. They’ll be lucky to make it to the end of the decade.
Well, this behavioral propensity on their part doesn’t appear to be a genetic problem, a psychological issue, or geographically an ecologically caused. Technological determinism and normal germ loads doesn’t seem to explain the behavior. In short, this peculiar behavior seems to be an idea problem carried by a bunch of discriminate, identifiable, sorts of people who now have access to twenty first century technology while carrying seventh century ideals in their heads–excuse the sociological profiling. That neutron bomb, the one that kills only people and leaves property and infrastructure intact, sure looks good at this point. Now that’s what I call asymmetrical warfare.
I’ll admit I’ve thought a good deal about neutron bombs in recent years as well. But it looks like that’s not going to be necessary. We keep hearing about how Egypt is a few months from mass famine, how Yemen is running out of water and how Syria is in a state of economic collapse. Seems like the best thing to do is just get out of the way, don’t give them any aid and make sure to seal off any refugee flow (although it would be a good idea to welcome coptic Christians with open arms).
Those would be brain dead ears not “deaf ears”. There is no part of this 7th century cultural anomaly that fits in the 21st century. Why do we import these people?.. it’s not like they are going to change. Many more drones will be required.
There is no issue of deaf ears. This is a ‘religion’ that is based on violence and over powering women. It includes total disrespect for any other religion, and a flat out desire to kill Jews, Christians, homosexuals, any woman they please after raping her of course, and cutting off limbs heads and whatever else appeals to them for no particularly good reason.
We are dealing with people who are truly mad. I mean frothing at the mouth mad. Barking mad, fit to be tied mad. People who have shunned things like liberty and self determination and aren’t all that sure how they feel about indoor plumbing.
I can’t be nice to them anymore, because they want to kill me and you and Israel, and the USA and everyone who isn’t muslim (and some muslims too.) It isn’t racism because they aren’t a race, they’re just nuts.
So when they scream “Discrimination!” we should be screaming back “You’re trying to kill me and my whole country.” If they want to remove that label they have to cooperate when their people blow stuff up or they hear about a plot to do so. Otherwise they retain the shame of being traitors to the country they should be grateful to.
Be like everyone else constantly offended and prickly as a cactus.
Mr. Spencer, than you for bringing the plight of the good citizens of Mali to everyone’s attention. It certainly deserves some attention since there are only 10 countries in the world poorer than Mali. Its a pity we don’t care more about Mali as an appallingly poor country rather than a country where we can criticize “radical Islam”. Now if we could just find Mali on a map….
It took 2000 years of schisms, reformations, counterreformations, enlightenments and revolutions for Christianity to become the largely tolerant and non-violent religion that it is today. What will it take for Islam to become a less aggressive religion and how long will that process take? I hope it does not take the destruction of our planet for Islam to become less violent.
Christianity always had the germ of love and redemption at its core. Islam? Not so much. I don’t think Islam will ever have a Saint Francis of Assisi.
[Thanks PJ. Great facts. Check this out - what I discovered on the web.]
The Background Obama Can’t Cover Up !
Islam, part of the Living River of History, can affect even the 2012 US election!
The “headwaters” of this River was Adam, according to Judaism, Christianity, Islam etc .
In the OT (Deut. 28), “tributaries” wanting to join the River will be blessed while “distributaries” who want to flow away from it will be cursed. Those wishing to totally separate from the fresh Living River will end up as polluted, dying “oxbow lakes.”
In the OT we see Israelites repeatedly flowing away from God, then repenting and returning to Him; we also see heathen “oxbow lakes” creating their own “gods” and being allowed by God to plunder and kill the erring Israelites.
Then, at the right time, the Living River took on new life with the arrival of the Promised One who offers “living water.”
In the 7th century Islam, drawing from both OT and NT, chose to be a distributary away from this River. Many scholars have viewed it as the final Antichrist: note “scourge” (Isa. 28), “Assyrian” (Mic. 5), “Euphrates” (Rev. 9) etc.
God will allow this “scourge” to temporarily persecute and even kill apostate Jews (JINOs) and Christians (CINOs). Jews, especially in “entertainment,” seem more expert in apostasy than Christians since Jews have been at it 2000 years longer than Christians have – but Christians apparently want to catch up to the Jews!
It’s apparent that others will join Islam in its end-time inquisition; its great oil wealth can captivate many leaders and already we are seeing apostate American leaders being bribed into turning against true American patriots.
Those who ignore (or try to dilute or destroy) the God-ordained Living River of History will be swept down it to an ocean made by their own never-ending tears of agony and despair.
The good news is that American JINOs & CINOs can overcome the “scourge” discussed above. The secret is found by checking out “II Chronicles 7:14″ & “John 3:16″ on the web.
And there’s still time – and freedom – before the 2012 “End of America” election to Google or MSN “Obama Promotes Public Sex,” “Obama a Black-Slavery Avenger?,” “Pretrib Rapture Politics,” “Mikey Weinstein, Jesus-Basher” and “Christ’s return is NOT imminent.”
In light of Matthew 7:2, if we tolerate Christian leaders who lie to us and steal from us, we shouldn’t be surprised if God allows us to have political leaders who lie to us and steal from us!
A Kansas Patriot (who won FIRST PLACE over 2200 entrants in a nationwide Americanism essay contest)
The difficulty here, for outsiders, is to understand that Islam insists that it is its *right* to treat other religions as inferior, because of course they’re not Islam. This goes all the way back to the al-Aqsa Mosqe and the Dome of the Rock, which were constructed where they are deliberately, as a provocation to Jews and Christians: Look, our religion is superior, here’s proof, we just stuck a thumb in your eye and you can’t stop us.
In addition to this, Islam has a profound disinterest in history. Egypt, under Mubarak, expressed some interest, but it was pretty unique amont Muslim nations. Now that the Muslim Brotherhood is in power, look for them to either destroy the Pyramids, try, or perhaps take a large ransom from the West, and destroy them anyway. Sadaam’s Iraq was also semi-interested, but remember he was secular until after the Gulf War, and only became devout in order (he hoped) to deflect an American invasion (which thankfully didn’t work). Muslims showed their respect after he fell by looting their museums, stealing many of the artifacts, and then selling or destroying them.
Each of these groups imagines that essentially everything in the world that doesn’t pertain to their branch of Islam can be destroyed, and everything that’s religious that doesn’t pertain to Islam *should* be destroyed, as idolatrous.
Islam destroys all history other than the history of Islam. And, for your information, Islam has no nation or countries, they only have the umma. Nations are the construct of western civilization. If you understood this, perhaps you could have written something useful.
Yes, irony is the key word here. I checked out Hart’s book, and it is nothing if not delusional. Since he has no proof of his claims for the existence of anything supernatural, he rails against “an atheism that consists entirely in vacuous arguments afloat on historical ignorance, made turbulent by storms of strident self-righteousness..” Thats rich, considering that religion’s entire existence has depended on nothing BUT vacuous arguments and historical ignorance, and is epitomized by strident self-righteousness. If that’s not the pot calling the kettle black, I don’t know what is!
He even criticizes Dennet for “the persistent misapplication of quantitative and empirical terms to unquantifiable and intrinsically nonempirical realities.” In other words, how dare someone point out the fact that there is no proof for the existence of my delusion? If I want to believe Santa Claus is real, then who are you to rain on my parade? Don’t confuse the issue with facts, that’s not playing by the rules.
Religion has made the rules for centuries, and doesn’t want to give up it’s position as an unquestioned reality. The problem with that is, scientific fact, the elephant in the room since Darwin, is becoming too large to ignore.
If Hart criticises Dennet for “the persistent misapplication of quantitative and empirical terms to unquantifiable and intrinsically nonempirical realities,” then the only aspect you should be tackling is whether his assessment of Dennet is accurate. But, going by your chosen response, I’m beginning to suspect that cool, logical debate is not your forte.
My previous reply didn’t appear so I’ll try again. Hart’s criticism of Dennet is only accurate if you accept his assertion that there are such things as “nonempirical realities”. That’s another way of describing “nonvisible entities”, invisible beings – i.e., the supernatural. It’s quite an easy, and in my opinion hypocritical way out of an argument – simply say that the rules that apply to all other claims do not apply to yours because yours are too lofty for that sort of lowly, earthly consideration. I would not call that logical debate- I’d call it dodging the issue.
It might well be that Hart is dodging the issue – I haven’t read him, so can’t comment. But what’s presented here is that “the supernatural” is equal to “invisible beings”, which are equal with “invisible entities”. I’m not sure I’m convinced that all those terms are equal.
But introducing concepts of the supernatural is not automatically a way out of an argument (and even if someone was trying to shut down the discussion with such statements as, “yes, but my stuff is all magic and cannot be explained,” that would be a non-argument, but I don’t see how it would be “hypocritical”).
Asserting that only that which can be quantified or tested “empirically” (I make the assumption here that “empirically” means using the scientific method) is entitled to be deemed real or true – that I consider to be dodging the issue and trying to evade the argument. Unless they can empirically prove that all non-quantifiable, non-empirical experience can be explained in quantifiable, empirical terms.
The “supernatural” is always invisible, except to people who claim to have “visions” of it, which of course cannot be empirically tested. This has always made it quite convenient for people to make up whatever they want and claim it as a “revelation” from God.
In fact, the whole concept of the existence of the “supernatural”, whether as a realm or beings, was made up by primitive people seeking an explanation for things that they could not explain, because they were ignorant of the facts of nature. (Read “The Golden Bough”).
Scientific exploration of the natural world has increasingly found natural explanations, based on actual empirical evidence, for 99.9% of things once considered “supernatural”. You can say that it can’t be proven that there is no such thing as the supernatural,and technically that’s true. I can’t really prove there is no Santa Claus. But if your only argument that he exists is that it can’t be proven that he doesn’t, you don’t have much of an argument.
Where the hypocrisy comes in is when religious people gladly use empirical evidence to prove things when it benefits them, but they retreat to the claim of a “nonempirical reality” when it doesn’t.
The supernatural refers to events and entities that run counter to the natural world as we understand it. Other than the claim that some supernatural “things” are supposedly invisible, I still don’t see how you’ve bolted those two together. And how about some empirical evidence for your (or Frazer’s) assertion about primitive people?
It’s certainly illogical, if not dishonest, if a person (religious or not) uses empirical evidence when it suits them, yet rejects empirical evidence when it doesn’t, but that’s not really hypocrisy. However, from a logical view, if a “nonempirical reality” (whatever that is) exists, by definition you cannot use empirical evidence to attack or defend it.
I did enjoy the fact you wrote “actual empirical evidence” in the same sentence as the made up statistic of “99.9%”
. Yes, I’m easily entertained.
Getting back to irony: If you start with the assertion that, “religion’s entire existence has depended on nothing BUT vacuous arguments and historical ignorance, and is epitomized by strident self-righteousness,” you are, ironically, giving a vacuous argument and demonstrating an historical ignorance of religion and the philosophical developments that surround it. The suggestion that religious belief has always been just a bunch of people telling fibs or putting their fingers in their ears shouting, “la-la-la” to anything that might undermine their worldview is pitifully simplistic. Aristotle and Aquinas would be spinning in their graves.
My previous post is meant as a reply to posts above by Bigland and Hub.
O.K.
First of all, hypocrisy IS dishonesty, by definition. It therefore IS both dishonest and hypocritical to use empirical evidence when it suits you and not to when it doesn’t. Which is what Hart does.
Secondly, I was just being nice by saying “99.9″ The truth is NOTHING supernatural has ever been proven or ever will be. It must forever remain outside the realm of empirical reality in order to “exist”, so to speak.
Reality, on the other hand, can and has been proven by – guess what! – facts and evidence every time!
And if you think my assertion is simplistic that the arguments of the religious are vacuous, maybe you should do some reading yourself, starting with Hart, who by your own admission is dishonest and hypocritical, not to mention illogical. Next try the Golden Bough, whose findings are based on, of course, empirical evidence.
5
Hypocrisy may be a form of dishonesty (dishonesty to others, and possibly to oneself), but dishonesty isn’t necessarily hypocrisy. Furthermore, selecting when you do or don’t use empirical evidence might not even be due to dishonesty; it might be due to stupidity or some other reason – hence my careful phrasing of, “illogical, if not dishonest”. I don’t know what Hart does because, as I said, I haven’t read him.
I’m inclined to agree with you re: proving the supernatural with empirical methods (in fact I think I said as much earlier) – you cannot use naturalistic methods to prove that which falls outside naturalistic boundaries. If you could, the supernatural becomes natural. I think Hart might be saying the same thing, but I won’t know without reading him.
I’m not sure what you mean by “Reality…has been proven by…facts and evidence.” Reality, by definition, is that which is real, regardless of facts or evidence. Perhaps you mean that facts and evidence are what define reality?
I don’t follow why my belief that your assertions are simplistic, etc., means I should read Hart or The Golden Bough, unless you’re suggesting that such reading will enable me to realise your assertions are complex and your arguments hold merit. The fact you state, “by your own admission [Hart] is dishonest and hypocritical” when I said no such thing suggests you need to brush up on logical argument and English comprehension.
I haven’t read The Golden Bough but I understand that, while Frazer is still regarded for some pioneering work, subsequent research has discredited many of his conclusions.
some of Frazers speculative conclusions about his research may have been later disproven, but the massive amount of findings themselves, concerning the beliefs and practices of primitive people, was all based on empirical evidence, so the basic conclusion – that belief in the supernatural and the superstitious practices which form the foundation of later religion were developed in the minds of primitive people – is not in dispute. I recommended you read it to see that the connection to empirical evidence that you questioned is there.
You admitted that to use empirical evidence when it suits you and not when it doesn’t is dishonest. If you want to split hairs and say that’s not hypocritical go ahead.
You say reality is by definition that which is real, regardless of facts and evidence. We know what is real precisely BECAUSE of facts and evidence. That applies to every aspect of life. To say that something is real without any evidence to back up your claim is ludicrous. Yet that is exactly what religion proposes to do. It wants to be allowed to play by its own rules, and have its own “reality”. It WAS reality for primitive man; now you have to choose to ignore reality in order to buy into it.
While the (second hand) data Frazer collected might still have value, it’s crucially his interpretation of that data that is questioned: in other words, his “findings”, his “basic conclusion”, are very much in dispute, if not outright discredited.
No, I didn’t admit that selecting when to use empirical evidence is dishonest. In fact, I said it “might not even be due to dishonesty,” which is almost the opposite. I’m not sure whether your misrepresentation of my remarks is deliberate (therefore dishonest) or due to poor comprehension. Nor am I splitting hairs – I’m insisting on proper use of words, particularly when people use such emotive ones as “hypocrisy” in debate. You’re still not using it correctly, and I still don’t know if Hart is dishonest, hypocritical, an idiot or if it’s just that his views are (also) being misrepresented by you.
As I suspected, you do believe “facts and evidence are what define reality.” Now it’s Descartes turn to spin in his grave. This could be the beginning of a philosophical discussion on the meanings of reality and perception, but I fear we’d be dragging the comments even further off topic.
Islam doesn’t promote cultural and religous intolerance. If that was the case, why would these shrines, the Buddha statues, etc have been in existence in muslim lands for centuries. It is the extremists, especially the ones that follow the wahabbi doctrine which commenced in the 1700 and performed similar, if not worse acts in arabia itself. The question is how did such a minor tribal sect with minimal influence become a major element. Look no further than the creation of the saudi state, which promotes the wahabi theology and method of interpretation. It is under the Saud family that the cleric in Abdul-wahab gained protection and propogated his version of Islam. His teachings were roundly rejected by the muslim scholars. The sect was limited to the arabian peninsula under the Ottoman Empire. However, with the support of the Brits, the sauds gradually gained control of the 2 holy cities and guess what had a new forum to propogate their version. Unfortunately now, especially in the west, Wahabbism is the dominant version of Islam being taught due to the funding of Saudi Arabia. Hence muslims are affiliating more to this version and often reject the traditional teachings. The teaching which actually promote tolerance in all facets of life and with the spirit of how it was originally revealed. Ask yourself this question. When the christian or catholic groups fight amongst themeselves in the name of God and Jesus, does that mean God and Jesus preached these versions, or was it the people themselves who interpreted the message the wrong way?
saf – thanks for the very informative post! And we have a president bowing down to these people. It clarifies the fact that most Muslims, at least until the Saudi’s influenced them, had grown out of the barbarism of the past, as have the other Abrahamic religions. The problem with all these religions is that they all contain in their foundational scriptures commandments that, if taken literally and acted upon, will result in bloodshed done in the name of its god. So it’s not only the result of peoples interpretation of it, its the fault of the writings of the religions themselves. Once people recognize that all of these writings were written by primitive men and therefore contain primitive and barbaric teachings, the religious excuse for murder will be nullified.
For the third time, I’ll try a last reply to Bigland, but my posts are disappearing. This has gotten too far off topic, I agree. But I’ll add one more thing – Yes, your suspicions are right – I do believe that facts and evidence are what define reality. If you DON’T believe that, then have fun in la-la land, where reality is whatever you want it to be.
That you think those are the only two alternatives shows you need to read more and assert less. Otherwise you will be the dogmatic, closed-minded individual you accuse all believers in religion to be.