Opus 2013-301: Headlines: Christians Persecuted in Egypt, Duh!, part 1 of 2

One of the ignored events common in the world is the Muslim persecution of Christians.  It is going on from Indonesia to Harlem.  It has great variety whether it be out and out murder to kidnapping children to sell into slavery.  It is usually ignored by the press.  I was glad to see an article in The Washington Time, National Weekly, August 26, 2013, pages 6-7 entitled “Egyptian Christians face unprecedented reprisals.” (sic)  The link will take you to the article on line with a slightly longer title.  I was disappointed that the article took the politically correct approach that this was “reprisals.”  Not so. 

This has been the standard policy of devout Islam since the Islamic world conquest began in 630.  There is a difference between “reprisal” and “intimidation.”  The same thing has been happening in Iraq and is going on in Syria.  The same thing has been going on, unreported for centuries.  Philip Jenkins said it this way about the Ottoman Empire,

“The modern concept of genocide as a uniquely horrible act demanding international sanctions has its root in the thoroughly successful movements to eradicate Middle Eastern Christians.” Jenkins, page 140

He then goes on to give some data you may not have heard before.

“Even in 1900 Muslims made up just half the empires overall population: Christians comprised 46 percent; Jews, 3 percent.”  Jenkins, page 149

In case you are lacking in geography and history, the Ottoman Empire was modern Turkey with its borders extended east through Armenia and South into Israel.

And more specifically,

“Constantinople, which had over four hundred thousand Christians in 1920, today has perhaps 4,000.  The city’s final Greek remnants largely vanished during a sweeping race riot in 1955.” Jenkins, page 163

Read those numbers again, friends.  During the time we are looking at we had the Armenian holocaust by the Turks.  Islam has not been nice to Christians.

Jenkins, Philip.  The Lost History of Christianity, New York:  Harper One, 2008.

To be continued...

homo unius libri

Opus 2013-34: Religion and Culture: Fatalism, part 2 of 2

Religious ideas effect a culture.  Fatalism produces stagnation.  It resigns people to their fate. That is one reason why the Muslim world is so weak economically and so lacking in what the West considers basic freedoms.  One of the criticisms you hear voiced is that the Muslim world still lives in the 7th century.

It was not always so.  I can’t find my source but one of the books I read spoke of a split in early Islam over this issue.  One side took into consideration Greek and Roman scholarship and felt like that approach was the way to interpret the Koran and the teachings of Mohammed.  At first they had the upper hand but another voice arose.  That voice was totally parochial.  There was to be only one source for truth.  No other thinking need apply. 

This explains what is called the “Golden Age of Islam” and why the gold slowly turned to lead.  There was a time when Muslim scholars were open and questing for knowledge.  They were trying to put things together in the way that the Romans and Greeks had taught. 

Consider this.

“It is common knowledge that medieval Arab societies were far ahead of those in Europe in terms of science, philosophy, and medicine, and that Europeans derived much of their scholarship from the Arab world; yet in the early centuries, this cultural achievement was usually Christian and Jewish rather than Muslim.  It was Christians – Nestorian, Jacobite, Orthodox, and others – who preserved and translated the cultural inheritance of the ancient world – the science, philosophy, and medicine – and who transmitted it to centers like Baghdad and Damascus.  Much of what we call Arab scholarship was in reality Syriac, Persian, and Coptic and is not necessarily Muslim.  Syriac-speaking Christian scholars brought the works of Aristotle to the Muslim world...”  (Jenkins, Philip.  The Lost History of Christianity, New York:  Harper One, 2008, p. 18)

During the Golden Age, Islam was doing what other growing cultures have done, building on the foundations of others. 

One of the Reasons that Western cultures became so strong is that they were open to ideas from many sources.  These ideas stimulate thinking, innovation and experimentation.  This brings change and sometimes that change is for the better.  One of the strengths of America is that we have always been a diverse population.  Modern tunnel vision sees culture through the eyes of skin color and does not recognize the real diversity that is in our foundation.  They see the black slaves and the white slave owners.  The people of the Founding Fathers generation saw a vigorous mixture of Scots, highland and lowland, Irish, Welsh, German (from a multitude of different Germanic cultures), French, Danish...the list goes on.  They considered themselves different races.  They found a way to work together in spite of their differences. 

They rejected fatalism.  How you view the nature of God makes a difference in the world you encourage.

homo unius libri