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FDRI

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[Genesis, 15:18-21; NKJ]
“To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates – the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”
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[Deuteronomy, 7:1-2; NKJ, '...you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them...' ]
“When the LORD your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you, and when the LORD your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them.
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[Deuteronomy, 9:1-4; NKJ, '... you shall drive them out and destroy them quickly...' ]
“Hear, O Israel: You are to cross over the Jordan today, and go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, cities great and fortified up to heaven, a people great and tall, the descendants of the Anakim, whom you know, and of whom you heard it said: ‘Who can stand before the descendants of Anak?’ Therefore understand today that the LORD your God is He who goes over before you as a consuming fire. He will destroy them and bring them down before you; so you shall drive them out and destroy them quickly, as the LORD has said to you.”
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[Joshua, 6:21; NKJ, '...they utterly destroyed all ...' ]
And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, ox and sheep and donkey, with the edge of the sword.
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[1 Samuel, 15:1-3; NKJ, '...attack ... utterly destroy all ... do not spare them ... kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child...' ]
Samuel also said to Saul: “The LORD sent me to anoint you king over His people, over Israel. Now therefore, heed the voice of the words of the LORD. Thus says the LORD of hosts: ‘I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'”
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Do you think what is just happening in the holy land today has the same reason?
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More sword verses:

[Qur'an, Al-Tawbah, 9:5]
Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they repent, and establish prayer and pay the alms, then leave their way free. God is Forgiving, Merciful.
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[Luke, 19:27; NKJ]
“But bring here those enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, and slay them before me.'”
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[Matthew, 10:34; NKJ]
“Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword.”
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Yes to Peace and Unity.

That is of that is what you are asking.

All we have to do is choose that path.

Simple, right :D;)

Regards Tony
 
Thank you for your comments. The verses I copied above are God's verses, aren't they? They are from the three main religion sources. If they are God's commands and if we try not to understand them or if we try to misunderstand them, how could that be in terms of faithfulness to God? Can anyone comment on this? Are there any translation errors in the verses, or any interpretation errors?
 
FDRI said:
Thank you for your comments. The verses I copied above are God's verses, aren't they? They are from the three main religion sources. If they are God's commands and if we try not to understand them or if we try to misunderstand them, how could that be in terms of faithfulness to God? Can anyone comment on this? Are there any translation errors in the verses, or any interpretation errors?
Click to expand...

It depends what one is trying to do with those verses?

They need context as to why they are posted, what is it you want to show?

Personally I see all those promises have culminated in events that have already unfolded and been fulfilled.

Regards Tony
 
FDRI said:
Thank you for your comments. The verses I copied above are God's verses, aren't they? They are from the three main religion sources. If they are God's commands and if we try not to understand them or if we try to misunderstand them, how could that be in terms of faithfulness to God? Can anyone comment on this? Are there any translation errors in the verses, or any interpretation errors?
Click to expand...

What are weapons of war in the spiritual realm? We could say that the verses you quoted here are allegorical, but that is a rather dry word which seems to deprive the spiritual realm of like... What I have come to see is that spiritual weapons are real but they are instruments of love. Yes, that's it. Even in mythology, such at, for instance, Excalibur.

This is just an embryonic understanding of war and weapons that I have. I really need a lot more revelations. But, as you can see, the possibilities are exciting. It's not a dead, conceptual realm after all. Once these kinds of revelations begin and one understands the forms and acceptable ways in which they will come to him, he must abandon himself to the awe and wonder.

Welcome to the list, by the way.
 
FDRI said:
[Qur'an, Al-Tawbah, 9:5]
Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they repent, and establish prayer and pay the alms, then leave their way free. God is Forgiving, Merciful.
Click to expand...

Wow copy pasta.

You clearly haven't analysed these verses at all, you just ctrl c v

Here is the so-called controversial part of the Qur'an you quoted, in full, as you can see it is referring to the looming end of a treaty with the idolaters, whom had been horribly violently persecuting the Muslims for years, chopping them to pieces and so on, forcing them to flee to another city, the verse is saying when the current term ends, they're going back to war because the idolaters had yet again broken their own treaty and attacked the Muslims - BUT if any of them repent, CARRY THEM TO SAFETY and don't hurt any that WERE ALWAYS FAITHFUL to their treaty - this is actually the most gentlemanly, generous terms of war you will likely find anywhere - do you know any better terms of war? Read the full version, please don't cherry pick:

009.003 And a proclamation from Allah and His messenger to all men on the day of the Greater Pilgrimage that Allah is free from obligation to the idolaters, and (so is) His messenger. So, if ye repent, it will be better for you; but if ye are averse, then know that ye cannot escape Allah. Give tidings (O Muhammad) of a painful doom to those who disbelieve,
009.004 Excepting those of the idolaters with whom ye (Muslims) have a treaty, and who have since abated nothing of your right nor have supported anyone against you. (As for these), fulfil their treaty to them till their term. Lo! Allah loveth those who keep their duty (unto Him).
009.005 Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.
009.006 And if anyone of the idolaters seeketh thy protection (O Muhammad), then protect him so that he may hear the Word of Allah, and afterward convey him to his place of safety. That is because they are a folk who know not.
009.007 How can there be a treaty with Allah and with His messenger for the idolaters save those with whom ye made a treaty at the Inviolable Place of Worship ? So long as they are true to you, be true to them. Lo! Allah loveth those who keep their duty.
009.008 How (can there be any treaty for the others) when, if they have the upper hand of you, they regard not pact nor honour in respect of you ? They satisfy you with their mouths the while their hearts refuse. And most of them are wrongdoers.
009.009 They have purchased with the revelations of Allah a little gain, so they debar (men) from His way. Lo! evil is that which they are wont to do.
009.010 And they observe toward a believer neither pact nor honour. These are they who are transgressors.
009.011 But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then are they your brethren in religion. We detail Our revelations for a people who have knowledge.
009.012 And if they break their pledges after their treaty (hath been made with you) and assail your religion, then fight the heads of disbelief - Lo! they have no binding oaths - in order that they may desist.
009.013 Will ye not fight a folk who broke their solemn pledges, and purposed to drive out the messenger and did attack you first ? What! Fear ye them ? Now Allah hath more right that ye should fear Him, if ye are believers




In fact when the Muslims finally conquered Makkah, they could have taken revenge for the years of terrible persecution, but instead the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) gave an amnesty except for a handful (really, only a few of them if l recall) of the most terrible war criminals there.

He even forgave the pagan lady - Hind bint Utbah - that mutilated his uncle's dead body and chewed on his liver on the battlefield (as the polytheists had a tendency of doing in war - if the Prophet was false, why did he choose Monotheism in that culture? Why not just make Allah into a new idol? Why go through all that? Besides he was always known as an honest merchant before he was chosen to become a Prophet). She soon became Muslim and was the mother of the founder of the Umayyad Caliphate dynasty, the first dynasty after the Rightly Guided Caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar bin Al Khattab, Uthman ibn Affan, Ali bin Abu Talib, Hassan, Husayn).

The Prophet had even earlier tried to pray at the grave of his arch-enemy in Medina, a powerful chief that got overshadowed by the Prophet Muhammad when the Prophet came to that city for refuge fleeing from persecution in Makkah. The chief, Abdullah Ubai bin Sallul hated the Prophet and was always making trouble for him. When the chief died, the Prophet felt sorry for him and tried to pray at his grave but a verse from the Qur'an was revealed at that moment telling him not to do so.

Please, it's wrong to mislead and that particular cherry picked accusation of yours gets debunked daily so why not listen to the rebuttals?

As for the Bible quotes .... no comment except please don't lump the Qur'an in with the Old Testament stuff.

I wish you well , l honestly don't think l'm better than you except in this one matter of accurately conveying info.
 
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I am trying to understand the actual reasons when it comes to violence, no matter what religion is causing it. If we don't understand the full rooted reason(s), our Interfaith studies won't help improve anything, and history will repeat itself one way or the other. That is, if God suggests killing, genocide yesterday, the same God may have suggested the same in the bible for today. It is also possible that God never asked us to kill, it is possible that what we are reading in the bible is complete fabrications of the rabbis. I think we should be studying these in a systematic manner.

I don't speak Hebrew or Arabic. I will appreciate it if you read the verses with no bias and tell your understanding sincerely without paraphrasing them. No one likes to have a religion suggesting violence, killing, genocide etc. However, if it is written there, it is there, we can't change it. But, it doesn't mean that we should start practicing it tomorrow early in the morning.

All that I say is that we all know that killing is being practiced in the name of God by some extremist groups. Is it possible that they are not actually extremists but just following God's command. If so we are on the other hand being just hypocrites by not hearing the commands out and by not obeying God fully.
 
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FDRI said:
It is also possible that God never asked us to kill, it is possible that what we are reading in the bible is complete fabrications of the rabies.
Click to expand...

The who?
 
FDRI said:
I am trying to understand the actual reasons when it comes to violence, no matter what religion is causing it.
Click to expand...
Then you first need to take a global view: Violence happens in cultures not of the Abrahamic Traditions, therefore the answer to your question is not found by examining religious texts.

FDRI said:
If we don't understand the full rooted reason(s), our Interfaith studies won't help improve anything, and history will repeat itself one way or the other.
Click to expand...
What fruits have your Interfaith studies brought forth so far?

FDRI said:
... it is possible that what we are reading in the bible is complete fabrications of the rabies. I think we should be studying these in a systematic manner.
Click to expand...
Two things:
The first is you've mis-spelled 'rabbis' as 'rabies' – rabies is a canine disease. Some might read this as intentional offence. That's why @Cino quite rightly made the point above.

What systematic manner have you employed in studying these texts? I'm trying to open the dialogue here.

On this board we have people ready to discuss Biblical texts from the basis of dogmatic theology on the one hand, across the range of interpretation to the historical value of ancient texts on another.

We have @RabbiO who can provide Jewish commentary. I myself have an understanding of the questions you raise from the Christian understanding of the Old Testament/Hebrew Scriptures.

FDRI said:
All that I say is that we all know that killing is being practiced in the name of God by some extremist groups.
Click to expand...
Such groups always find an excuse for their outrages.

FDRI said:
Is it possible that they are not actually extremists but just following God's command.
Click to expand...
Is that what you think?

FDRI said:
If so we are on the other hand being just hypocrites by not hearing the commands out and by not obeying God fully.
Click to expand...
Or perhaps we have another way of interpreting sacra doctrina?
 
Is it possible that they are not actually extremists but just following God's command.
Click to expand...
"Thou shalt not murder" is pretty universal across all major religions, so I would find what you suggest here to be against the grain. Would you care to demonstrate? What exact verses are you referring to?
 
Just a few more thoughts and then I'll shut up (which I should do more often I think) and let the thread proceed. If we see the command to killing as a real, spiritual thing, then what dies? Who wins? If it is love doing the killing, then surely we all live and die by the sword, and in the end we all live.

I personally shrink from such things, as I have my own dreams about how things should be. So I avoid the death that might save me. I fear the unknown. My dreams are the last of what I possess. But perhaps love has better dreams, better plans than mine. If I die, will I be left alone forever? These are terrible things to contemplate.

I want to love everyone, especially those who believe differently from me, but I know I can't. Why?

Let's say FDRI made a Freudian slip which shows at least the possibility that there is a real disease at work in me that keeps me from fully loving all. Shall I not then submit to the killing of that disease? Not an easy thing for me because I can't comprehend love and it's ways, I actually rather fear it for a number of reasons.

This is why I avoid perceived kill zones, because I fear they are just that and nothing else. No love, just a war game.

However, just a hint of love changes everything. If I know the hand that smites love me I immediately become more pliant, more submissive to love's embrace even though I know it will hurt. I have a sixth sense about these things, but what I am saying is that it is love and only love that can give me a chance to lay down arms and submit to death. That is the drop of water in the desert that I long for.

In interfaith we might like many from other traditions, but this is not enough really. Only as liking is exchanged for love do we have any chance of bridging the gap caused by the confusion of tongues.

So I am going to try harder (and probably die in a very painful way). I must learn to give up on my own dreams and let love do the arranging. It will include that element of death. It's so much easier if one could feel that they are loved, but I don't have that luxury. I cling to moments where I knew I was loved, by the universe, by God, by Allah (so many different names could be used here). The moments are fleeting and hard to hold onto. The disease performs a mind wipe and all that is left is the heart's desire somewhere in there, trying to claw it's way to the surface.

But there it is, love once again being the answer. Not a concept or a duty, but a fire that burns inside. At the moment, I have nothing, I'm numbed out.
 
Thomas said:
Then you first need to take a global view: Violence happens in cultures not of the Abrahamic Traditions, therefore the answer to your question is not found by examining religious texts.
Click to expand...

I would agree that the reasons for violence are not primarily of religious origin.
The Qur'an states:

"Mankind is violent in his love of wealth"

However, we can learn a lot more from studying the Qur'an. We have been instructed to defend ourselves.
Could Almighty God do that for us? Of course He could, but that is not His will.

He has given us the responsibility to govern ourselves, and He only intervenes in a major way occasionally.
i.e. Noah's flood, the drowning of Pharaoh's army

The Prophet Muhammad, peace be with him, informed us that as we approach armageddon,
there will be an increase in unlawful killing.The person killed would not know why he was killed, and the person killing
would not know why he was killing. This is happening more and more often.
Sometimes the perpetrators are Muslims, and sometimes they are not.

It's a kind of madness. Major sins are increasing in the world to such an extent that it is affecting all of us.

Blunt your sword .. keep away from trouble .. wait for Jesus to return.

Armageddon is getting very close now. Trump's attitude didn't help "Bring it on !" :rolleyes:
There will not be peace in Jerusalem for long. There are many reasons for that.
We all have to live with it. Injustice is nothing new.

..and the life after death is superior to the pomp and wealth of this life.
 
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“He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.” -Revelations 13:10
 
Thank you very much. Love is a nice word, not a problem. But if I know that one day you may attempt to kill me (because the word 'kill' exists in your dictionary), I wonder how love is going to take place. Here is what I want to discuss here: Did God ever order killing, genocide in the bible, in the old & new testaments, in Qur'an? Is it possible that the related words may have misspelled, misread? Is it also possible that the related words are complete fabrications of rabbis (sorry my earlier misspelling)?

For example, early Quran manuscripts didn't have dots above and below words, as well as vowel symbols.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early...e:Qur'anic_Manuscript_-_3_-_Hijazi_script.jpg
That is, words like Baa, Taa, Thaa were written with the same way, the letter were identical. Another example, Faa and Qaaf.
As a result, word قتل [kill] [https://translate.google.com/?sl=ar&tl=en&text=قتل&op=translate] could be read as قبل or فبل. Basically readers make their reading choices, based on the context of course. As far as I know Hebrew has the same issue. All I want to discuss here is that God really ordered the killing or Satan actually did.

Please also check this video :
{{{ Why did Cain murder Abel? The First Murder (Genesis 4:1-16) }}} If this is true, we are descendants of Cain and killing is just fine, a legacy.
 
FDRI said:
Did God ever order killing, genocide in the bible, in the old & new testaments, in Qur'an? Is it possible that the related words may have misspelled, misread? Is it also possible that the related words are complete fabrications of rabbis (sorry my earlier misspelling)?
Click to expand...

Why (and how) would rabbis fabricate any words in the New Testament or in the Quran? That is nonsense, in my opinion.

Also, the text of the Hebrew Bible predates the rise of rabbinical Judaism.

Your question is interesting, but it is just as interesting if you let go of your nonsense theory that some ancient rabbi changed these texts. On a forum dedicated to interfaith dialogue, such insinuations have no place at all. You got the letters right this time, but not yet the spirit.
 
@Cino

I don't agree with your last post at all.

Call priests "Rabbis" or "Scribes" or what have you, it makes little difference.
The OT is comprised of different scrolls of varying ages and authors [ as is the NT, for that matter ].

What makes you think that some of the text hasn't got changed or misinterpreted on revision over 1000's of years?
Why were new prophets sent to Bani Israel if there was nothing wrong with what the Pharisees were teaching?
John the Baptists' head was put on a plate, and Jesus was put on a cross.

Why would G-d only guide only Bani Israel and not the rest of mankind .. and then only when Jesus comes along,
it was for everybody?
Why is it alright to swindle "goy" [ charge them interest ] but not your Jewish brother?
Why does G-d make a covenant with a people, and reward them even if they no longer honour it, just because
they are a particular color or lineage?

The Qur'an is only 1500 years old, and it basically confirms the Bible, but points out its
idiosyncracies.
Naturally, many people don't like it. They want to follow their own way .. they want to have privilege.
In the time of Jesus, many Jews did not believe in life after death, and were only concerned with the here and now.

I am fully aware that many Jews DO currently believe in life after death .. and there are also different definitions of
"Who is a Jew". There is the Zionist definition .. and then there is the spiritual one..

I'm not picking a fight with anybody. I respect other people's opinions, whether Jew, Christian or atheist.
I'm quite happy to have this conversation with Jewish people, and am aware that many Jews have embraced Islam
over the years. After all, if nobody embraced Islam, there wouldn't be any Muslims in the world.

I'm sure that some Muslims have become Jews, but not many. Why revert to an older revelation, when you
have the current one which confirms "the law" and what is kosher and what is not?
 
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