Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Mohammad Would Weep

The truly righteous becomes a refuge for humankind, their lives and their properties.

Mohammad
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Hello Daraa, Syria. May violence cease.
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Deplorable violence is sweeping through the Middle East like an unstoppable virus. Governments shake and our Arab and Muslim brothers and sisters are being killed and injured at an alarming rate. Leaders point their fingers at each other as the causes for the protests and yet the protestors take to the streets in front of slaughtering gunfire because as one protestor said "It is better to die than to not be free."

The Quran was written about 14 hundred years ago, from 610 on. According to Islamic history it was dictated to Mohammad by the angel Gabriel off and on over a period of about 12 years and finally collected into a single volume. So Islam is about 600 years younger than Christianity and much younger than Judaism. 600 years ago Christendom was emerging from the Dark Ages into the Renaissance. Can it be said that the anguish and struggle of the Muslim people is the result of an emerging from their own Dark Age? Perhaps, but if so what makes it a Dark Age? The original Ottoman Empire was one of great art, architecture, and literature. But then so was Christianity before it reached into it's own darkness.

In 1450, about the time the Quran was being distributed and read, the Gutenberg Bible was published in Europe. Even so Europe went through centuries of struggle and violence trying to renew itself. The Bible wasn't the problem. The Quran is not the problem. It is not a book about violence and destruction as anyone would know who has read it as I have.

Sad to say there are more eastern nations who are on the edge of the precipice to mayhem and murder. And how many more adults and children will die, and when will the last blood be shed and the dust finally settle? I'm reminded of the prophesy which says that the laws of peace, kindness, respect for others and love must be preached in every land, and listened to, and understood, and undertaken, before the end can come..

In the mean time where is the righteous one, the one offering refuge to humankind? Not in the United States where a "Christian" pastor burns the Quran, where people won't let Muslims build a mosque where they can or allow their girls to wear their scarves in school.

What can I do about it? What can you do about it? We can offer our prayers, or, if we aren't the praying types, offer up some hard positive thoughts to those who are fighting for the right to be free, for a rapid end to the violence. The martyrs will fall where they must. The survivors will disserve a renaissance.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
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Never Give Up
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SPRING QUESTION
(This is not a contest)

NASA has planned to send a two man mission on an 18 month trip to the planet Mars. It would take 6 months for the astronauts to get there and after 6 months of exploration another 6 months to return.

Should they do it and why, and if not, why not?

dbdacoba@aol.com

6 answers so far

I eagerly await your answer.

DB
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2 comments:

Beth said...

Very good questions, D, and I don't think there are any easy answers.

Frankly, I'm to the point where I have little but condemnation for any religion. I'm all for tolerance, but what are we to think when we continue to see violence done in the name of religion? And it happens among ALL religions. I don't find it acceptable for a cartoonist to receive death threats because he dared to draw Mohammed. I also don't find it acceptable for anyone to burn another's holy book (not that I have such great respect for holy books, but books in general just shouldn't be burned).

I really have no use for the lot of them. Go ahead and kill each other, but just get out of my face.

Harsh? I suppose. Ask me if I care.

Hugs, Beth

Geo. said...

Hard questions indeed. Is tolerance even enough? Where political misbehavior draws sectarian lines I usually go mystic: There's only one religion and it is all of them. Then I hightail it before answering Jeremiads start their signatory rumbles.