Shaking my fist and yelling impotently at no one who will actually read this

[usernamenumber]

"How much do we back down? How many times do we back down?"
- The idiot preacher planning "International Burn a Koran Day" (hosted by his church, which is called the "Dove World Outreach Center", apparently for the lols)

The answer is seven times seventy, asshole. Sound hard? Sound unfair? Suck it up. Real Christianity is hard. Those who presume to preach in Jesus' name should not be getting schooled on the fundamentals by people like me.

And don't think the people threatening violence if he goes through with it get a pass, either. I may not know your scriptures well enough to call you on it, but how 'bout we all just chill the fuck out, mmkay?

/badmood

Comments

[breakinglight11.livejournal.com]

"The answer is seven times seventy, asshole."

YES. THANK YOU. Gah!

[hahathor.livejournal.com]

I'm kind of flabbergasted by the ratio of

• people who are making a fuss because they think it's insensitive and inflammatory to build a cultural center to promote understanding of Muslims (hint: there are millions of 'em world-wide, tens of thousands in the US, fewer than a dozen associated with 9/11) and
• people who are making a fuss because they think it's insensitive and inflammatory to set fire to an important religious text

. Supposedly there are about 30 people associated with this church who support the action - that's more than twice as many as the number of Muslims who were in the planes on 9/11. Yet there are no calls to prevent churches from being built within 4 blocks of libraries.

[medeaschild.livejournal.com]

...but I may start just such a movement.

[bkdelong.livejournal.com]

I don't really watch news anymore unless it's clips from "The Daily Show" but my MIL is up and she watches Newshour on PBS each night.

While watching the segment on bookburning I was grumbling at the screen how it was the "same goddamn god" but in retrospect, all this pastor was talking about was the religion or Islam and how evil it and its practitioners are. No mention of Allah (praise be) or really reference to the Qu'ran.

Now I'm not sure of how Evangelical Christians view Christ - (I'm far from up on my various doctrines) but something tells me notsomuch the peace-loving, forgiving, laid-back hippie I view "the Lord's son) him as.

In the Abrahamic faiths God is the same god for Judaism, and Islam and (for the most part) Christianity, (though Muslims do not believe God "does not beget nor was he begotten", people. He just is called a host of different names as are his Angelic servants and Infernal enemies.

Yet, as I sat there watching them get B-Roll on PBS of this pastor's estate, I saw a series of signs: "Islam is the Devil". How can Islam be the Devil when it has its own incarnation of the Devil?

So I did some quick reading and research:

(NB: I'm being a bit wonky with my capitalization here. Wavering between trying to respect all the religions I'm speaking about and my own beliefs.)

According to some interpretations, Iblis (a jinn created out of "smokeless fire" by Allah) had a falling out with Allah over Adam when he wouldn't bow to him as commanded by his master. He felt as a jinn he was far superior despite Allah's soft spot for his "clay" creations.

Iblis was cast out and hence known as "Shaitan", (which supposedly translates as "devil" or mischievous") whose sentence is apparently to bathe in Hellfire, along with that of his followers, is suspended until the "Day of Judgment".

He is allowed to walk the Earth until that day where he has apparently vowed to convert as many "Sons of Adam" off the straight path and become a follower.

That's the jist of the story. I'm sure there's more to it.

So ISLAM is the Devil? The Qu'ran should be burned? Has this guy red the story of Iblis/Lucifer's fall to Shaitan/Satan while disobeying God/Allah? Sounds a might familiar.

*sigh*

It really is ignorance of this and not taking the time to bother to even try to understand another's practice that irritates the hell out of me. Drives me to rage.

[wyldelf.livejournal.com]

My thoughts exactly.

There is also this passage, which I found when someone playing Devil's advocate asked "What about eye for an eye?":

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:38-48&version=KJV

[usernamenumber.livejournal.com]

Argh, it drives me nuts when people who claim to be Christians quote the old testament to justify themselves (eg "eye for an eye"), when the whole point of Jesus' ministry was to fulfil the old law and bring a higher, harder law. But because it's easier to say "the book says you're bad!" than to actually act with love even toward one's enemies, even unto death, the weak keep falling back on it.