Political compass for the21st century

[Eric the Green]

(11-16-2018, 04:24 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: The Koran was written in wartime, when most of the disbelievers that Mohamed faced were enemies intent on destroying him. Necessity forces moderation of the more bloodthirsty sayings in the Koran. Mainstream Muslims (which separates such fascists as the Taliban, al-Qaeda, Daesh, and Boko Haram, all generally recognized as heretics to most Muslims) are not at war with 'unbelievers'. There are parts of the Islamic world through which I would not now travel under any circumstances -- but there is also North Korea, which illustrates the principle.

I am not going to excuse subjection or compulsory conversion.  

We have plenty of excellent movies from the early 1940s that portray Germans and Japanese in an unflattering light. Do most Americans accept that the unflattering light about America's wartime enemies is relevant today? Of course not. Muslims have had to cope with such powerful entities as the British Raj in India and in turn India.

The Koran was written some decades before Mohammed's war from Medina to conquer Mecca. The notion of jihad is that of an internal, spiritual war against temptation. Thus in essence Islam is not a warrior religion. It is about surrender to God; that's what the word means. Islam is Judaism for Arabs. It is worship of the One God, the Judaic God.

All religions can be corrupted by fundamentalism. That certainly has often applied to Christianity, and more-recently to Islam.