It pissed me off yesterday when ABC radio news said that the purpose of Benedict's visit was to "mend fences," as if the Pope had done something to legitimately offend Islamo-psychoes.
The only offense Benedict has committed against them is the same one any non-Muslim is committing... existing.
They want us all dead. How hard is that to comprehend?
That headline should be: Rationality and the Problem of Islam.
We really should dispense with all the philosophy foreplay and sophistry Tariq Ramadan pushes and deal with these irrational animals already.
Looks like the Pope is moving the chess pieces around by visiting the head of 300 million Orthodox church
Very thought provoking. Thanks for posting.
Thought this would interest you
One of the things that is conveniently overlooked by the Islamists among us is that just prior to the Muslim invasion of Spain, Isidore of Sevilla had written the Etymologies, a vast 20-volume compendium of "all human knowledge" at the time (7th century). All of the West was struggling from the barbarian invasions, which destroyed Classical culture, and people like Isidore were instrumental in seeking to recover the lost knowledge. He collected and recopied classical sources, although by that time, after the barbarian invasions, there was a more limited supply of classical works in the West. The work, however, was important even into the Rennaissance, and preserved many classical writings that were completely lost by that time.
The first Muslim rulers (after the 8th century invasions of Spain) were not Arabs, but were recently converted people from Baghdad and Persia, areas which had a long pre-Islamic tradition of learning, science and art. Many of these areas also had some of the lost classical originals, and brought them into the Spanish research world. However, as Islam consolidated, particularly with the influence of the writings of its ignorant Arab founder and leaders, who then attacked the other Muslims in Spain and replaced them, it gradually stifled learning. Rechristianized parts of Spain, such as Toledo, resumed scholarship with things such as the famous "School of Translators" of the Christian king Alfonso X, where Christian, Jewish and Arab linguists were set to work translating works ranging from Scripture to Aristotle. Alfonso's Siete Partidas, one of the first modern codes of law, was influenced by his Classical research.
The fundamental dynamic of Islam is anti-knowledge, anti-scientific; it was only in its early phase, before it had fully consolidated, that science and art were even permitted, and as it became more established, it crushed them wherever it found them and to this day is a dead hand on any society it enters.
Actually Maimonides and his family had to flee from idyllic Spain when he was still relatively young. They first went to Morocco, and eventually to Egypt, so I would guess that Maimonides didn't do much of his writing in Spain.
ML/NJ
These two forces found their level in Ashariism, which acknowledged the utility of reasoning, but only the Quran, the Hadith, the Sunnah, and the customs of the entire Ummah were sources of legislation. At that point, any custom widely adopted by the Ummah could be viewed as correct, because Allah would not allow the entire Ummah to be deceived -- that's how headcovering became customary for all Muslim women. Originally, only Mohammed's wives were required to cover their heads, but Muslim invaders soon encountered Byzantine women who wore headcoverings as a status symbol. Women in Muslim garrison towns wanted to look good for the dhimmis, the fashion spread, and a Quranic justification was found for it.
By the fourteenth century, the Sunni declared the gates of ijtihad to be closed and that all past legal decisions were sufficient for modern and future use. This locked many Muslims into the fourteenth-century's juridical interpretation of seventh-century tribal custom. Reforming this aspect of the culture from the inside will be a task equal to, or greater than, such movements as the Protestant Reformation. But it may be the best hope for Islamic civilization.
One thing I like about the Bible is that even if you don't believe it is the divinely inspired Word of God you can still find wonderful stories and great wisdom in its pages. Personally, I believe it's the Word of God.
One of its pearls of wisdom is when Jesus told his disciples that you know a tree by it fruit. Pretty simple, huh? You can put a sign on a grapevine identifying it as a naval orange tree and people who don't know different will believe you. But once that vine bears fruit there is little doubt as to what kind of plant you're dealing with. The Islamic tree is bearing fruit, and I don't see any evidence of the fruit of the tree being peace. The fruit it bears is an anathema to every principle I believe is taught in the Bible.
If they want to consider their tree to be a Peace Tree then they are going to have to show me some Peace fruit from the tree. What I am seeing all over the world right now, being done in the name of their Peace Tree is anything but.
save
good article
good article
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1712730/posts
Averroes 'dual truth' doctrine is indeed part of the foundations of European culture: it is adhered to by all the secularists who regard religion or 'spirituality' as a private sphere where relativist notions like 'your truth' apply, while science is taken as giving a different notion of truth. It, at least, unlike al-Ghazali's occasionalism didn't kill off the possibility of empirical science.
I'm suprised Ramadan had the timerity to include al-Ghazali in his recitation. The lunatic Palestinian sheik I was critiquing in the second part of the linked piece, at least had the wit to only invoke Avicenna and Averroes in his attempt to claim rationality for Islam.
Where Islam failed was in not having either a Renaissance nor an Enlightenment. Those two events moved western religious and political thought away from the dogmatism of the Medieval period and advanced the idea of individual liberty.
When Alice fell down the rabbithole & entered Wonderland was she actually in Mecca?