A Religion of Peace?

For almost five years now, President Obama and his close friends at CAIR have been insisting that Islam is a religion of peace and that the evening call to prayer emanating from a brightly painted minaret is one of the worlds most beautiful sounds. There have been some things in the news that have caused me to question Mr. Obama's basis for this claim. We can start with the Boston Marathon bombing. Even more recently, a Canadian firefighter, sitting in a cafe, enjoying a cup of tea, was attacked by a young Muslim who stabbed this man and almost decapitated him. How about 71 Christians killed in a Pakistan church. Or the 68 non-Muslims killed in a Kenyan mall. Or even the Coptic Christians that are being killed in Egypt and their churches burned. There is much more but I don't want to overstate. It would seem that there is reason to doubt our Presidents point of view.

I have been thinking about writing a blog about this subject for some time now. In expectation of this I down loaded a copy of the Koran to my Kindle (it is free if you should want to check my research) and did some reading. I am not even close to being a religious scholar. I simply copied down some bits and pieces from some of the Surah so we could examine the holy book that Islam holds in such reverence. So in their own words:

Surah 2:223
Your wives are a tilth (field) for you, so go to your tilth when or how you will,

Surah 3:28
Let not believers take disbelievers as friends instead of believers, and whoever does that will not be helped by Allah in any way.

Surah 3:151
We shall cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve,

Surah 4:34
As to those women on whose part you see ill-conduct, admonish them first, next, refuse to share their beds, and last, beat them lightly, if it is useful

Surah 5:38
Cut off the right hand of the thief, male or female as recompense

Surah 5:51
Take not the Jews and the Christians as friends, they are but friends to one another. And if any amongst you take them as friends, then surely he is one of them.

Surah 8:12
I will cast terror into the hearts of those who have disbelieved, so strike them over the necks, and smite over all their fingers and toes.

Surah 8:36
And those that disbelieve will be gathered unto hell.

Surah 8:69
So enjoy what you have gotten of booty in war, lawful and good

Supplementing this is the tenet of Taqiyya. This allows a Muslim to lie to a non-Muslim at any time about anything to advance the cause of Islam. There is also the tenet of Kitman, which allows them to withhold information that would be detrimental to their cause. To me, this causes serious trust issues. 

There is a great deal more in the Koran. I have neither the time, patience, nor stomach to go through the whole thing. It most certainly does not seem to meet my idea of a peaceful religion. It is true that I picked out things that are antithetical to my own philosophies. But I truly see no peace there.

I grew up a Christian understanding the New Testament to be the basis of modern Christian thought. That is a religion based on love, understanding, and forgiveness. Times change. Religions evolve with enlightenment. Civilization must leave behind the violence of the early years, if we wish to survive. Using violence to prove a religion's rightness only proves it's inhumanity.