From "The Sufi Soul" by William Dalrymple:
"The Tablighis are now probably the largest Muslim missionary movement in the world, and advocate a return to the basic fundamentals of the Koran. They greatly dislike Sufism, the mystical face of Islam, and believe that Sufi shrines like that of Nizamuddin encourage such un-Koranic practice as idolatry, music, dancing and the veneration of dead saints. With his dark skin, wispy beard and narrow eyes, Amin did not look like a Delhi-wallah. He was an aircraft maintenance engineer from Dacca [JK: Bangladesh] who had come to Delhi [JK: India] to learn more of the teachings of the Tablighis, and to help preach what he considered to be the proper ways of Islam....
“So,” I asked, “what do you think of the Sufi idea that God can also be found in the human heart?”
“Paradise within us?” said Amin, raising his eyebrows. “No, no: this is emotional talk - a dream only. Is there evidence for this in the Koran? Real Islam is more disciplined than that: there are rules and regulations that must be followed: how to eat, how to wash, even how to clip your moustache. There is nothing in the Koran about paradise within the body. It is outside. To get there you must follow the commands of the Almighty. Then when you die, insh’allah, that will be where your journey ends.”
Here, it seemed to me lay some sort of crux - a small but vitally important clash of civilisations, not between East and West, but within Islam itself. Between the strictly regulated ways of the orthodox Tablighis and the customs of the heterodox Sufis lay not just two different understandings of Islam, but two entirely different conceptions of how to live, how to die, and how to make the final and most important, and difficult, journey of all - to paradise."
If you want to understand the Sufis a little bit better, Winds' "Sufi Wisdom" category offers a bit of a window. But now it's time to shift from India to places beyond, and to focus on the Salafists, Hojjatieh, and their ilk rather than the Sufis. For that, however, what we need isn't an expat but a shrink. Several, in fact, as we look at Islam's einsatzgruppen, the psycho-mechanics of death cults, and how G-d is drawn....
We'll start with The Anchoress, whose post "Abdul Rahman Vanishes - Deathfans and Fascists afoot" has some interesting thoughts and links. Including this one:
"Yeah, yeah, Death to Christians, Death to Jews, Death to cartoonists, Death to gays, Death to unveiled or “dishonorable” women, Death to the West. Death to all who don’t agree with us! Death, Death, Death - that’s all these people know. Maybe it’s because they know so little about loving life?"
Well, yeah. I mean, they've told us that more than once. "Spengler" adds this important point:
"Sacrifice is the universal means by which religions enable the faithful to come to grips with death.... All religion submerges the ego, in anticipation of the day when death will destroy the ego for all time. Sacrifice, namely giving up something of one's self, is the universal vehicle for reducing the ego. Sacrifice becomes terribly dangerous when the ego cannot re-emerge under the sun and sky of the real world. There is a distinction between a spiritual identification with Jesus' suffering, and nailing a live volunteer to a cross, as do some Catholics in the Philippines."
Aye, there's the rub. Over to Dr. Theodore Dalrymple, with a story for you from Britain:
"I noticed one day that his mood had greatly improved; he was communicative and almost jovial, which he had never been before. I asked him what had changed in his life for the better. He had made his decision, he said. Everything was resolved. He was not going to kill himself in an isolated way, as he had previously intended. Suicide was a mortal sin, according to the tenets of the Islamic faith. No, when he got out of prison he would not kill himself; he would make himself a martyr, and be rewarded eternally, by making himself into a bomb and taking as many enemies with him as he could.
Enemies, I asked; what enemies? How could he know that the people he killed at random would be enemies? They were enemies, he said, because they lived happily in our rotten and unjust society. Therefore, by definition, they were enemies - enemies in the objective sense, as Stalin might have put it - and hence were legitimate targets."
An orientation that is not by any means confined to Islamists, and underlies much of the modern Left's thinking as well. But let's stick to our focus. Sigmund, Carl & Alfred's "Really, Really, Succinct" stitches together a series of posts from The Anchoress, Dr. Sanity and Shrinkwrapped. The key line? In speaking of Islam's killers and suicide bombers it quotes the simple question:
"I wonder if in his religious ecstasy experience there is room for a consideration of the possible pain of his victims?"
The short answer is obvious, the longer one revealing. Over to Shrinkwrapped's key post. Ecstatic Terror was born after reading a Times of London on-line article called "Are you ready? Tomorrow you will be in Paradise...", discussing ~250 interviews of people who had been trained as suicide bombers and failed in their missions. This was also the study that had inspired Dr. Sanity. Shrinkwrapped writes, correctly:
"Her work is chilling. Her subjects describe an entire industry devoted to creating suicide bombers. A key part of the preparation of the "martyrs" is their psychological preparation....
The suicide bombers have made it perfectly clear that they deny the humanity of all non-believers. This is a signal distinction from every other religion. Evangelicals may believe you cannot be saved if you do not agree with their beliefs. They may work hard to "save you", though typically are respectful of those of us who do not desire saving at the moment. The Islamist agrees that you are bereft of Allah's love and offers "submission" to Allah via conversion, or "submission" via dhimmitude, at the point of a sword.
Inadvertently, Tom Friedman, of all people, agrees with my thesis..."
"The secret of this story is in that conversion - and so is the crisis in Islam. The people and ideas that brought about that sudden conversion of Hasib Hussain and his pals - if not stopped by other Muslims - will end up converting every Muslim into a suspect and one of the world's great religions into a cult of death."
Ultimately, it's about the way one constructs one's god - but the twist is dark, because the vision of the Islamists denies the very humanity of non-believers. Ultimately, what they create is a deity in their own image - and that deity, no less than the terrifying Aztec gods of murder and sacrifice, is a bloody-jawed monster. Back to Sigmund, Carl & Alfred's "Really, Really, Succinct":
"In other words- if we are reading Dr Sanity clearly, the suicide bomber not only has to accept the notion of a venegeful Allah, he must also create that god for himself and embrace the call that created god extends him.
This is not unlike the culture that produced Nazi ideology. It was one thing to celebrate and embrace Aryan superiority- it was quite another to enforce that ideology. Nazi records are replete with memos reporting how 'front line' extermination soldiers could not always be counted on to do the job- indeed, they were often reluctant to murder innocents. There were reports of soldiers deserting and disobeying orders- clearly an intolerable situation for any army.
In fact, a special unit, The Einsatzgruppen, was established purely for the purpose of murder. Regular army troops could not be counted on to get the job done.
The suicide bombers are the modern day Einsatzgruppen. Their mission is not motivated by politics or economics, though like Hitler's Nazis, that was the excuse given."
I've heard some idiot commenters describe Naziism as "Christian" before. That is a profound ignorance given the regime's open and ideological declarations of the need to extirpate that religion and replace it with a religion of the state, one dedicated to a fusion of modern totalitarian thought with pagan gods of war and death. Which certainly sounds familiar these days.
The thing to remember, however, is that this is all a deliberate human construct. It can therefore be un-constructed by the classical human methods. Dr. Sanity's "Union With An Evil God notes:
"It is possible,though, that Allah may be getting a bum rap. In the movie "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", Jessica Rabbit--who is always responded to as a wanton sex kitten--exclaims in frustration at this depiction of her, "I'm not bad! I'm just drawn that way!"
Allah may not be so bad. Perhaps he's just drawn that way...?"
There's a lot to this. Ali Eteraz at Unwilling Self-Negation, in an interesting and deeply insightful post that concludes:
"Why, instead of being receptive to the notion of Muhammad's spiritual makeup, have we made him into some kind of austere caricature of himself? A cold, unfeeling man! As if being a man means being dispassionate. Rest assured, it is us who made Wurther into a Warrior. Before the West called him Mahound we were calling him Conqueror. We were the ones who spoke of the "conquest" of Mecca. We who talked so disparagingly of "the pagans." We who attributed stoning to him; attributed to him battle-martyrdom; we, who, even when he went to heaven, sent him upon a winged stallion, as if it takes a cavalry charge to be near God. These are descriptions the belivers posited. This is not Orientalism. This was long before Edward Said. Long before the Crusades. It was us — you and I — who celebrated Muhammad on the basis of his virility instead of his humility. You and I who emphasized his political leadership, without reminding ourselves that he began with shepherding a flock of sheep. If was you and I who did not allow Muhammad to remain a man. We wanted him to be able to predict the falls of Rome, Constantinople, and the coming of the anti-Christ — even the occurrences (the details) in the Day of Judgment. We wanted all this because we were weak. We could not accept that we followed the suggests of a man who fought not pagans but loneliness. We could not accept when he was like us — because we could not accept ourselves. So we twisted him. We gave him foresight as if he were a soothsayer; we gave him Hercules' strength; Don Juan's charisma. We gave him the all-seeing eye of God. We went so far as to say that on the Day of Judgment, Muhammad would rise to become greater than God. Don't believe me? It was you and I who said that when God condemns, Muhammad saves.
Muhammad was only a man who left a book for posterity. Yet now Muhammad is an idol. And idol that is exclusively maintained by the Muslim. In facts, as recent events demonstrate, we do not allow anyone else the permission to idolatorize him.
Ghalib warned us not to lift the covers off the Kaba lest we might find an idol? I peeked, and I found the idol was called: Muhammad."
And with the idol comes the more ancient customs of the fire-mawed gods, complete with the select of the young being urged into immolation upon an altar venerated by the community.
Commentators like Tony Blair have called aspects of Islamism "pre-feudal," and others have referred to today's Islamists as a 10th century faith. In the end, that may well be giving them altogether too much credit. But the weapons Islam's self-appointed High Priests seek, and will purchase, to build that grand sacrificial altar to their fire-mawed god will be distinctly of our centuries. An altar meant for sacrifice, death - and ritual submission before its bloody-handed priests and their devotees, given open and official license to prey on the community entire.
We would not be the first society to believe itself above and beyond a fall into a Dark Age, and find itself wrong. As Wrtchard notes in "The Return of the Ripper":
"It is not enough, as the British Army has done, to look on at this mayhem from the outside in, blinded by the illusion that these executions are just one more quaint ethnic practice that the guilt-ridden West has no right to criticize; that it is one more expression of identity that one is obliged to tolerate, whether these sanguinary events happen in British-patrolled Basra or the British city of Leeds. The wellsprings of terrorism arise from certain tendencies within Islamic society itself; and unless the weeds are pruned the flowers will never grow, until we find ourselves alone at midnight in the Garden of Evil."
And Spengler, more strongly still, from a very thought-provoking 2004 article entitled, simply, "You love life, we love death":
"Whether the human ego can stand up to this absolute power is a different question; whether Islam has a propensity to produce a necrophiliac brand of radicalism is a question that the West will continue to ask. That issue is only tangential to the matter of al-Qaeda's challenge, which simply means, "Unlike us, you are unwilling to give your lives for your cause. "Evidently that is true of the Spanish; if it becomes true of the West in general, radical Islam will win."
Yet that same article also recalls the distinctly Western George Patton, who said "Your job is not to die for your country. Your job is to make the other poor bastard die for his country." That is the Western way, and one of the classical human methods for "un-construction" of threats. And so it is that the ancient injunction calls to both sides of the divide:
"This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Therefore, choose life, that you and your children may live."
- Deut 30:19
I think your use of Deutoronomy is a bit out of context.
The passage you quoted was referring to a "contract" that the nation of Israel made with God.
A.) Love God with all their heart/mind/souls and follow his laws and they will prosper. Deut. 20:20 says "Choose to love the LORD your God and to obey him and commit yourself to him, for he is your life." So Moses is equating God's love with their life.
B.) Love themselves, worship other gods, and they will be conquered and scattered about.
Here's the full text.
So their choice wasn't merely "love life," it was "love God." Sometimes loving God meant destroying entire cities/cultures and stoning idoliters and prostitutes.
It's not that simple.
I meant to say Deut. 30:20 says "Choose to love the LORD your God and to obey him and commit yourself to him, for he is your life."
quite a beautiful essay, Joe.
but completely wrong, spengler, dr. sanity, etc.
The perception of G-d, Allah, whatever supernatural entity you choose, is not the problem. The problem is universal belief in an afterlife.
That is what makes life on earth bearable, and dictates one's behavior in order to achieve the next world.
All afterlives - and their entry conditions - are not created equal.
lol.
a translation problem?
;)
ha ha, i meant deuteronomy was a translation problem.
perhaps.
but shouldn't you then attack the afterlife concept of Islam, and not the Allah concept?
i hesitate to mention this again, but Tom Hill's motivation was identical to Muhammed Atta's, and surely they worshipped different gods.
Any afterlife concept can be exploited by fundamentalists and fanatics.
here is a thought experiment for you to try.
what would happen if everyone stopped believing in an afterlife?
you can still believe in god, if you like.
Scientology's example teaches us that any concept at all can be so exploited.
I see no point at all in making the afterlife vs. Allah distinction you mention. They are both part of the same fundamental(ist) idolatry.
here is a thought experiment for you to try.
what would happen if everyone stopped believing in an afterlife?
you can still believe in god, if you like.
Quoting John Lenon?
I think you would get what we are seeing more of today: Existentialism or hedonism as the end goal of life. Everyone out to satisfy their own desires at the expense of others.
Heck, the ultimate goal of Buddhism is no afterlife - that you've advanced to the point of becoming nothing. Are Buddhists any more peaceful than atheists?
So, Joe, you are saying Tom Hill and Muhammed Atta worshipped the same god?
I have no idea who Tom Hill is, and you haven't made a coherent argument for that idea. So I didn't address it.
derek, lol.
buddhists work toward nothingness on the wheel of kharma.
it is both an afterlife and a reward for behavior.
I have no idea who Tom Hill is
oh, sorry, thought you were reading the thread the other day.
here
According to Wikipedia:
In Buddhism, parinirvana is the final nirvana, traditionally understood to be within reach only upon the death of someone who attained complete enlightenment. It is the ultimate goal of Buddhist practice and implies a release from the cycle of deaths and rebirths as well as the dissolution of all mental aggregates (form, feeling, perception, mental fabrications and consciousness).
If not nothing, then what is it?
derek, it is still a goal to work towards, a state of being.
perhaps in the end it is nothingness, but it is a goal worked towards through transient states.
right action moves one up through incarnations to enlightenment.
i am talking about how the concept of afterlife informs behavior in life.
what would happen if everyone stopped believing in an afterlife? you can still believe in god, if you like.
What kind of bargain is that?
Tell you what. The afterlife is a pretty seriously important belief, so I'll have to trade it for two other beliefs. I think we can settle for the first law of thermodynamics and the Buchanan US Presidency.
Oh, and as consideration for my negotiations I only require a minor fee: have Norman Rockwell and Pablo Picasso trade places in the aesthetic canon.
Deal, or no deal?
Deal.
;)
Jeff: I think we can settle for the first law of thermodynamics and the Buchanan US Presidency.
That first one is kind of a deal-breaker.
Do you believe in reincarnation? I'll trade that for the Quantum Theory of Gravity and $1000 in Confederate Treasury Bonds, and we'll pretend "Godfather Part III" never happened.
And BTW, does anybody have a Unified Field Theory? None of those e-bay deadbeats has a Unified Field Theory.
"I'll trade that for the Quantum Theory of Gravity and $1000 in Confederate Treasury Bonds, and we'll pretend "Godfather Part III" never happened."
That's the dream! You've led a hell of a life, Tanzarian.
"And BTW, does anybody have a Unified Field Theory? None of those e-bay deadbeats has a Unified Field Theory."
Speak for yourself. I have a theory. And that's how we know the universe to be banana shaped.
It's belief in an afterlife that moderates behavior, not belief in a Supreme Being.
Buddhists, for example, believe in a spiritual afterlife and that belief encourages "right" action in this life.
AFAIK Buddhists don't believe in Allah (or any other Supreme Being).
It's belief in an afterlife that moderates behavior, not belief in a Supreme Being.
Buddhists, for example, believe in a spiritual afterlife and that belief encourages "right" action in this life.
AFAIK Buddhists don't believe in any Supreme Being.
It only remains to say that it is our sacred duty to help as many of the Islamic matyrs as possible on their way to paradise as fast as possible. Of course, this does not mean that we have to give them an honour guard.
The sooner the holy places of Islam are visited with thunder and starfire, the better.
Maybe then they will realise where the final authority lies. And that is not with their millenium-old vision.
Sorry for the spelling mistake. "millennium".
Ian, I've periodically speculated that the use of nuclear weapons against Mecca and Medina might "break" the religion of Islam by demonstrating empirically that the might of the US military was superior to that of the false god Allah. After all, it worked with the Japanese, yes?
Others here have pointed out the problem with this: the really violent and crazy Muslims (really the source of most of the trouble) aren't exactly rational, and would thus be unlikely to change their behavior on the basis of such a demonstration. That said, some benefit might be derived by the conversion of most moderate Muslims to other religions, thus depriving the extremists of some of their cover.
Since the only victims of such a plan would be foreigners in the service of an enemy religion, I see no reason why committed US nationalists would oppose it. The cost of implementation would be so low, and the lives of hundreds, maybe even thousands of US citizens might be saved.
The primary difference between Islamic "terrorists" and ordinary victims of the mental diseases we call Islam, Judaism, and Christianity, is that selection pressure has gifted the latter with ample doses of cognative dissonance, hypocrisy, and heresy.
Let's take, for example, the founder of this rather large blog, Joe Katzman. He's a reasonably intelligent person who also exhibits considerably above average concern for his fellow man -- if this wasn't true either he wouldn't be blogging against terrorism or nobody of intelligence would read his blog.
He also "is" a Jew. Judaism nominally involves the worship of a supreme being described in an ancient collection of books. This God very clearly promotes racism, ethnic cleansing, ritual genital mutilation, outdated dietary restrictions, capital punishment for homosexuality, total warfare against other religions, etc., etc.
Joe doesn't advocate most of the above, although it's likely he still goes along with the ritual genital mutilations and dietary restrictions. Why does Joe go along with some of the Jewish traditions and not others? Expediency. Many of the "commandments of God" have a very high cost in the modern environment. People who attempt to carry out these commandments have difficulty surviving, reproducing, or propagating their ideology. As a result, the religion of Judaism practiced by Joe has been quite thoroughly corrupted and perverted from its original form.
This is a good thing. Heretics and infidels like Joe are much nicer and more decent people than the original Jews. The same can be said for the vast majority of corrupt Christians, decadent sinful Muslims, etc.
The problem with Islam isn't that the Koran is full of crazy nonsense. All the old religious texts (and many of the new ones) are full of crazy nonsense. Selection pressure over the generations has led to most of the crazy nonsense being ignored by most of the "believers" most of the time. What remains of the insane nonsense is usually retained because these delusions (like the existence of a benevolent God, an afterlife, etc.) help the believer cope in the face of brutal reality.
For this reason, attacking a religion on the basis of its holy texts is rather silly. I could found a death cult tomorrow based on the Holy Trinity of Baby-Killing, Arson, and Ritual Consumption of Salami -- if it survived hundreds of years it's likely most of its adherents would eat lots of salami, possess lots of old art glorifying murder and destruction, and otherwise be indistinguishable from ordinary people.
Many of the "commandments of God" have a very high cost in the modern environment.
How is the modern environment different than when Judaism or Christianity began? War against Israel has always been a threat, and occupation of their land is not new. Christians have certainly been persecuted - faced with physical pain and death - for their beliefs. The pagans of the Roman Empire certainly held their polytheistic ideas as "superior" to the "supersticious" Christians.
The problem with Islam isn't that the Koran is full of crazy nonsense. All the old religious texts (and many of the new ones) are full of crazy nonsense.
Have you read any of these texts? What makes you say, for instance, that the Protestant Canon of the Bible is complete nonsense? I think you'll find that the internal consistency, historical accuracy, and prescriptive statements in the Bible are still very relevant and truthful, given careful study and research of both sides of the truth/falsehood debate.
You seem pretty eager to simply brush away the testimony of hundreds of generations.
Selection pressure over the generations has led to most of the crazy nonsense being ignored by most of the "believers" most of the time.
Such as? Was it really a matter of Jewish doctrine to wipe out heathen cities, or was it a one-time commandment by God? Do Muslims really demonstrate the willingness to give up violent Jihad? The only instance I can think of is Judaism's capital punishment for adultery and sexual perversion. However, these ended when Israel was no longer under a rabbinic theocracy (the diaspora to modern day democracy in Israel).
How is circumcision (or as you say, "genital mutilation") any worse than piercings, plastic surgery, or tattoos?
Were those "outdated dietary restrictions" really meant as a "good health policy" or were they really meant to culturally distinguish Jews/Muslims from the heathen?
Christians would agree that the rituals alone do not a relationship with God make. So, the silly idea of rituals really is a silly idea. In what way, then, do you disagree with Christians?
What remains of the insane nonsense is usually retained because these delusions (like the existence of a benevolent God, an afterlife, etc.) help the believer cope in the face of brutal reality.
So then I'm assuming you've defined what this brutal reality is - that there is no such nonsense as the God of Judaism or Christianity. How can you be so certain?
What we've boiled down to is, which belief system is most believable?
A.) There can not possibly be any god
B.) There's no god, per se, but some spiritual state that you'll reach some day. Somehow someone figured this out on their own and can claim it with 100% certainty.
C.) There is some sort of god out there, but it'll never reveal itself. He'll leave it up to our own understanding. So, if you're prone to bad decisions or a dull wit, you're just out of luck.
D.) There are a bunch of gods out there that fight with eachother. You just have to pick the right one. Good luck!
E.) There is a perfect, good God, who cannot tolerate any evil whatsoever, but somehow with enough rituals, worship, and good behavior, will let you go to heaven. This includes blowing people up or establishing a global state based on his laws.
F.) There is a perfect, good God, who cannot tolerate any evil, but gives us a limited time to make up our minds whether or not we want to choose evil or believe that he simply gave us a way into heaven by simply believing that he loves us enough to die for us, even though we are by nature, evil. Those earlier rituals and laws show us that there's no possible way we can "work our way into heaven."
Derek,
Judaism's answer re: A-F is "none of the above." Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan's "If You Were God" would probably be very interesting to you, even as a Christian.
I'll add that TJ is right about the Bible containing a lot of things that Jewish and Christian believers ignore. We don't stone gays, for instance, and vanishingly few folks in those religions even advocate that we do so.
I'll add that this example is a double-edged argument, because the "selection pressure" argument doesn't really apply to it; these religions simply decided on moral grounds that this did not fit. Nothing new, the Sanhedrin were side-stepping such injunctions even back in ancient times, when few would have thought the practice remarkable.
TJ is half-right, therefore; flexibility is important for a religion, but it's a certain kind of flexibility. He refers to heresy because to his view, all religion is evil and if you accept that, heresy is required to be good. But TJ misses the very tangible nature and influence of a religion's internal moral code upon that religion's evolution, independent of selection pressures. Since one's god is generally the source of that moral code, it's worth paying very close attention to how a religion constructs and envisions its god.
I do not believe that I worship the same god as the Islamists under a different name - and that's because I don't. I would give a different answer if you asked me about Christians. Or Rumi. Or, I suspect, Ali Eteraz.
This would also be the point where I poke at TJ a bit about the way he misses the importance of religion's internal moral code... and note that in the absence of a deity, the default god appears to be the state. The EU being the latest example.
With Passover coming up, TJ, you might consider how important that story is to the development of the idea that the state is not the highest thing, and therefore that liberty with respect to the state is not only good but necessary. The very beliefs you stand on may owe an awful lot to the guy played by Charlton Heston... and more specifically, to his behind the scenes help.
>>I'll add that this example is a double-edged argument, because the "selection pressure" argument doesn't really apply to it; these religions simply decided on moral grounds that this did not fit.
How were such "decisions" made? Some heretic rabbi/priest deviated from whatever dogma was currently accepted, thus creating a (formal or informal) sect within the larger religion. If the deviation improved the religion's infection strategy" the new sect gained in influence until eventually it became the new dogma. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Evolutionary psychology, Joe.
In order to get a handle on this Salafism thing, we need to figure out precisely how this particular practice of Islam drifted into an unpleasant configuration. The fact that Salafism draws on certain nasty aspects of the Koran is IMHO a distraction, because the other holy books (including yours) contain similar madness which isn't acted upon.
Something about the Al Qaeda philosophy is infectious. Not terribly infectious, but nasty enough for people to chew up vast quantities of bandwidth worrying about it.
>>This would also be the point where I poke at TJ a bit about the way he misses the importance of religion's internal moral code... and note that in the absence of a deity, the default god appears to be the state.
In the presence of a deity, the default State appears to be God. God, and the threat of God's judgment, has been a very effective tool of coercion by the priestly classes for many generations. The masses of sheeple are conned into believing that they will be rewarded and punished by some fantasy God on the basis of their obedience to his laws. These laws are, of course, interpreted by the religious authorities, who historically have worked arm in arm with the politcal authorities. It's a cheaper and less bloody mechanism of control than keeping the mobs in line with physical force. The con works especially well if the rulers themselves believe the gibberish. People who ascribe cynical motives to the Iranian mullahs should keep this in mind.
>>The very beliefs you stand on may owe an awful lot to the guy played by Charlton Heston... and more specifically, to his behind the scenes help.
I'm sure if I wandered around in the desert long enough I'd start hallucinating too. Maybe while I was hallucinating I might come up with some good ideas about how to rule my tribe. People using LSD often come up with clever ideas -- but these ideas come from their own brains, not from God.
Luckily we don't need either self-deception or force to develop a moral system.
>>So then I'm assuming you've defined what this brutal reality is - that there is no such nonsense as the God of Judaism or Christianity. How can you be so certain?
Auschwitz.
Hitler empirically demonstrated that the God of Judaism was either unwilling or unable to help his "chosen people" in their most desperate time of need.
>>What we've boiled down to is, which belief system is most believable?
A1. There very likely isn't any God, or at least no God similar to popular religion's conceptions of such.
Putting aside fundamental disagreements over Deism for the moment (TJ - that Aushwitz link was brutal!), the observation stands that both Sufi mysticism and Salafism arise from the same primary text (just as Unitarians and the Skoptzy autocastrati(?!) both claim the New Testament). Culture is weird that way, and religions mutate over time, often in wildly unpredictable ways (though one would think group cohesion and ability to propagate the faith surely form some sort of reality check). Isolated and in the absence of petrodollar fuelled indoctrination centers (schools, churches) radical militant Islam would probably burn itself out in a few dozen dystopic backwaters - those guys are incapable of making the trains run on time, if at all. Unfortunately, petrodollars and our freedom/decadence/success, and the cognitive dissonance this poses to notions of Arab/Islamic supremacy, is the fuel to their fire. Something has to give.
If the goal is to corrupt/delegitimize/extirpate the beliefs that give rise to militant Islam before we (the West) catch a nuke and the problem becomes radically simpler/horrific, then the tactical options before us narrow considerably (particularly since only a fraction of the citizens of the West, Left or Right, really 'get' the problem, or its magnitude). Further, it's hard to see how much external influence (as non-Muslims) we have in this regard. Weakening the cost of exit (putting international pressure on Muslim countries to actually prosecute honor killings, and allow freedom of religion, for example) might be something outsiders could do.