Freedom of opinion and freedom of expression may hurt but that is what freedoms are all about...
It’s often said by those of faith that secularists and atheists aren’t free to criticise their beliefs simply because they are held so dearly. This idea, that religious beliefs ought to be held in a special place, is a terrible one. We should be free to criticise all beliefs. We should push for change. We should empower the secularists, atheists and agnostics. We should allow them to have a voice on all matters. (REASON OVER FAITH: The freedom to criticise).
Why it’s okay to criticize religion and politics but not gender, race, or disability???
Paul Russell, a professor of philosophy at both the University of British Columbia and Gothenberg University, has written a thoughtful piece at Aeon magazine that I commend to your attention: “The limits of tolerance.” Perhaps the thesis is self-evident to many of us—you can choose how tenaciously you hold your politics and religion, but not your gender and ethnicity—but it bears reading by those who zealously call out “Islamophobia” when Islam is criticized, or defend all religions against attack because, after all, it’s religion.
The thesis is based on the idea in this paragraph:
Some claim there is an analogy between the identity politics of religion and the issues that arise with other excluded groups based on race, gender, sexual orientation, disability and the like. What is supposed to hold these divergent identities together is that the groups in question have been treated unequally, or do not receive adequate recognition in the existing social and legal system.
Religious groups require protection to secure their rights and recognition of their particular interests in practising their religion. Yet, however plausible these claims might be, there is a key distinction that needs to be made between identities that are based on what can be broadly described as ideological or value-laden commitments, and those that do not carry any such baggage. This distinction is essential to understanding the role of (religious) toleration in a liberal, democratic society.
What Russell means by “religious toleration” is not “refraining from criticism of faith”, but respecting the worth and dignity of others, and not demonizing them or depriving them of rights, but rather
. . . acknowledging and accepting disagreement and ideological conflict. Religious tolerance does not, therefore, involve a commitment to affirming the equal worth and value of all doctrines and practices that fall within the scope and bounds of tolerance itself. With respect to religion, tolerance involves allowing and preserving a space for criticism as well as affirmation.
In other words, criticism of religion is valuable for the same reason the First Amendment is valuable: it allows the airing of all views under the assumption that some kind of socially salubrious consensus will emerge. Indeed, that is the content of America’s First Amendment: it implicitly allows free expression of religious criticism. If criticism of religion is deemed off limits (not by law but by people, as with some elements of the Right and Regressive Left), then it doesn’t disappear, but goes underground. That’s why I’m opposed to laws against “hate speech”: it doesn’t eliminate hate, but prevents it from being countered with better speech.
Russell’s point is not that criticism of race, gender, sexual orientation and so on should be banned, but rather that it can be dismissed as bigotry without the need for discussion. Being Asian, white, or black, transgender, gay, or female are not matters of choice, and there is no moral ground for demonizing someone for something they cannot change. This does not mean, though, that ideological positions based on these “non-ideological identities” don’t deserve open discussion, for they do, including matters like affirmative action, third-wave feminism, and so on.
This all rests on a crucial difference between religion and politics on the one hand, and things like gender and ethnicity on the other:
Race, gender and, more recently, sexual orientation are forms of identity that have been especially prominent in politics during the past century. What is striking about these forms of identity is not only that they are generally unchosen, but that they are not based on any ideological or value-laden set of commitments of a political or ethical nature. Of course, the significance and interpretation of non-ideological identities, the ways in which they can be viewed as threatened or disrespected, is itself an ideological matter; but the identities themselves are not constituted by any ideological content (systems of belief, value, practices, etc), and the groups concerned could vary greatly in the particular ideologies that they endorse or reject.
For this reason, there is no basis for criticising a group (or individual member of it) on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation. It would, for example, be absurd to praise or blame Martin Luther King Jr for being black, or Margaret Thatcher for being a woman. There is no ideological content to their identity to assess or debate – the relevant identity is an inappropriate target for praise or blame, since there are no relevant assessable beliefs, values, practices or institutions to serve as the grounds of such responses. The identity of the group turns on natural qualities and features that cannot be discarded in light of critical scrutiny or reflection of any kind.
With ideological or value-laden identities the situation is different. The most obvious of these identities are political, constituted by doctrines, beliefs and values that have implications for our social and ethical practices and institutions. The crucial question for tolerance, is: where does religion stand in relation to this divide? Religious identities are, I contend, heavily ideological and value-laden and, in this respect, more akin to political identities than to those based on race, gender or sexual orientation.
This difference is not just a matter of religion being subject to choice, as the roots and sources of religious identity are generally more complicated and complex than this. A person’s identity as Christian, Muslim, atheist and so on might, to a great extent, be a product of culture, education, socialisation and even indoctrination of various, overlapping kinds. What really matters is not so much that the person’s particular religious identity is chosen but that it has some relevant ideological content and is, to that extent, sensitive to criticism, reflection, discussion and debate. Religious identities, like political identities, however they might be acquired, can still be discarded or radically amended: they are not natural features that a person is incapable of revising. You might be born into a Catholic family, brought up a Catholic, have spent most of your days among Catholics, but that doesn’t mean you can’t at some point discard this religious identity.
This, then, is the distinction between, say, bigotry against Muslims and criticism of Islam—something that many of the Left fail to grasp—or deliberately ignore. In politics as in religion, not all ideologies are equally good or bad, and how do you sort this out without freedom to criticize? (Again, we’re talking about social opprobrium here, not legal strictures.) If that freedom is denied, religious tolerance in fact diminishes, as people are either forced into stifling views they still hold, or are mentally lumped together with genuine bigots, like those on the Right who really are prejudiced against Muslim people.
Russell’s article is long and nuanced, and discusses many issues and caveats that I can’t go into here. One, though, is the matter of “fused” identities: the case of someone having both ideological and nonideological components to their identity, like a practicing Muslim whose identity was based on the country of birth that promoted her faith, or on a common language like Farsi or Arabic. Russell still argues that the main component of a religious identity is ideological, but we have to be careful in how we handle this. With Islam, the label “Islamophobia” is the worst way to do that:
These general considerations concerning fused identities are obviously relevant to the issue of religious tolerance. Among other things, they make clear why labels such as ‘Islamophobia’ – however well-motivated – are problematic and confuse issues that should be carefully distinguished. Terminology of this kind leaves the nature and content of the identity in question unsettled and indeterminate in crucial respects. It encourages the view that criticism of the Muslim religion, as such, should be assimilated to forms of racism and sexism. Until the ‘Muslim’ identity in question is carefully unpacked, the case for grouping any and all such criticism under the heading ‘Islamophobia’ is itself dangerous and intolerant, as it encourages the suppression of reasonable and legitimate debate and discussion about the merits and demerits of Islam.
And, as we all know, it is the Left and not the Right that has genuinely failed to recognize the nuance here. After all, it is the Huffington Post, not Breitbart, that has a section called “Islamophobia,” a section that regularly labels valid criticism as bigotry. Here are the dangers of that approach:
It is essential that the Left – Old or New, along with whatever particular identities it might want to draw on – carefully distinguish these issues of tolerance and religious identity. As long as the Left continues to conflate and confuse these issues and presents (legitimate) forms of criticism and condemnation of religion as unacceptable forms of bigotry and racism, it will be the enemy of genuine religious tolerance and effectively play into the hands of the real bigots and racists, who are happy to use the language of religious tolerance to conceal their hate-fuelled agendas.
We cannot hold back from criticizing ideologies that we consider objectionable simply because those who hold them are deemed “marginalized”. We know that’s why so many on the Left are happy to say palpably false things like Islam is “empowering for women” or is “the most feminist of all religions”, while at the same time happily go after Republicans, for Republicans don’t adhere to a given ethnic group or gender. (It’s interesting to ponder what the Left would do if most blacks were Republicans, but that’s a non-issue because the nature of the Right and the self-interest of African- Americans prevents such a circumstance.)
But all this still leaves one question unanswered: if religion and politics are both largely ideological in nature, why is religion in general seen as something that shouldn’t be criticized but politics can be?
Anyone who criticizes religion, as have people like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins or even a small fish like me, quickly learns that you arouse rancor in many on the Left, and they’ll find lots of irrelevant reasons, like “excessive stridency”, to dismiss your arguments. It’s not okay to say that “Christianity is bunk”, but fine to say that “the Republican platform is bunk.” Yet politics is as much a part of a person’s identity and self-image as is faith, so that can’t explain the difference. I remain stymied.
Creation In Bible
Man was created on Earth, in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 2:8).
The Bible describes clearly what was made on each day of Creation Week. The ‘Big Bang’ is excluded by this sequence (E.g. Earth before Sun).
Creation in 6 Days which are clearly Earth-rotation days (c. 24 hours).
Man and the animals were created vegetarian (Genesis 1:29–30). No death and suffering in the original creation.
Man was created naked (but not ashamed—Genesis 2:25).
All things were created through Christ and for Christ. He was pre-existent to Creation (e.g. Genesis 1:26, 3:22, 11:7; Micah 5:2; John 1:1–3, 10; 3:13; 6:62; 8:35, 58; 17:5, 24; Romans 11:36; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Colossians 1:16–17; Hebrews 1:2).
Creation In Quran
Man was created in Paradise (‘janna’),1 not on Earth (first couple later banished to Earth, e.g. Koran 2:36).
No clear details of each creation day. Some vague clustering of the days in 41:9–12.2
Creation also in 6 ‘Days’2 but could easily be interpreted as ‘millions of years’ (see main text).
Carnivory (and thus death and suffering) apparently integral to life on the created Earth from the first. The Koran (6:142, 16:5, 40:79) says that cattle were created for man to eat.
Genesis
Chapter 1
26. And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness:1 and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
27. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
28. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Genesis
Chapter 2
19. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.2
In the Qur’an:
1. Adam was created by Allah as a creature lower than angels.
2. Allah taught Adam all the names of the animals in order to put the angels to shame.
20. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
In the Bible:
1. The creation of man was the last and finest work of Almighty God, because no other creatures, including angels, were made in the image of God
2. God brought to Adam, as ruler of the earth, all of the animals for him to give them names and Adam did his first job well. It had nothing to do with angels!
The Bible holds that God created angels and then made man in his own image. The Koran states that Allah fashioned angels from light and then made jinn from smokeless fire. Man was formed later, out of clay. Jinn disappointed Allah, not least by climbing to the highest vaults of the sky and eavesdropping on the angels. Yet Allah did not annihilate them. No flood closed over their heads. Jinn were willed into existence, like man, to worship Allah and were preserved on earth for that purpose, living in a parallel world, set at such an angle that jinn can see men, but men cannot see jinn.
Conclusion: And in creation, God created Angels without gender and without free will just like robots. And God created the Djinns with both gender male and female in one body and with free will and God created the animals with gender both male and female but without a soul and then God created Adam with a Male gender and later decided to create the female gender after seeing Adam dreaming of a partner out of lonesomeness of being alone in a world of creation.
Since God can be alone by thyself, Why can't Adam?
Did Adam dream of having a Family?
Eve was quite literally a Dream Girl, as Adam slept deeply while God prepared her. His joyful excitement upon meeting her can only be imagined as he said, “This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of my flesh. She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man.” (Genesis 2:23)
Why Was Adam Lonely If God Is Enough?
‘God purposely created the world to function in such a way that He is not enough for us. This is why God says, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone.’ If God were all that Adam needed, then Adam would not be alone. But he is alone. Not because God is there, but because one of his kind is not. By choice, God limited His ability to be everything Adam needed. This flies in the face of what many of us have heard. On a regular basis, I hear people say, ‘All you need is God. God is enough.’ Well, that sounds nice, but the problem is that it isn’t true, or even biblical for that matter, from a relationship point of view. If we’re talking about grace, then these statements are true. God’s grace is enough. However, if we’re talking about relationships, they’re not.” So, Pastor John, does Christian hedonism teach that God is enough to satisfy every relational longing for our souls? Or has He created us with an INTRINSIC NEED for others that God cannot satisfy?”
DREAMS: And after naming all the creations of the creator as taught by the Creator, Adam got bored and into him comes a Dream...
I want more Impossible to ignore Impossible to ignore
They'll come true Impossible not to do Impossible not to do...
That is an absolutely excellent question and the reason it is an excellent question is that it grows out of a text, Genesis 2:18. And the Lord God said it is not good that a man should be alone. I will make a helper fit for him. So on the face of it God clearly does not want Adam to respond. No thank you. You have got it wrong, God. I am not alone. I have you. So God thinks the present state of creation is not the final good that he intends, namely the man and the woman having God together. So having another human being is not a luxury in God’s mind. So it seems Bennett’s case here is pretty strong. It looks like an overstatement to say to Adam in the garden: God is all you need. And let’s make the case stronger by adding a few other texts like 1 Corinthians 12. God arranged the members of the body each one of them as he chose. If all were a single member where would the body be? As it is there are many parts, yeah, one body. The eye, so let’s say Tony Reinke is the eye. The eye cannot say to the hand—John Piper: I have no need of you. Nor, again, the head can say to the feet: I have no need of you. So there is God almighty in his Word saying flat out: You dare not say to another member of the body of Christ: I don’t need you. That is a sin to talk like that. In other words, God forbids us from saying: I have God. I don’t need members of the body of Christ.
ALONE: If God had and always been Alone, Why does Adam dream of Eve? And if the Son had and always been alone, Should the believers be Alone too?
Mark these words: Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. So clearly God created a material universe not just a world of spirits and he created other souls, not just one soul to relate to him. And he created society and the Church, not just isolated souls relating to him. And in doing all of this, creating the world, creating the Church, creating society, he ordained that we be benefited by all these things and that some of them be essential for life: food, water, shelter, clothing, air. And others be essential for obedience, like love your neighbor as you love yourself. You couldn’t obey that command if there were no neighbors. You need a neighbor in order to obey the command love your neighbor. So it is not wrong to talk about needing the neighbor in the sense that God has set it up that way. And all this is a result of God not creating just idolatry or occasions for idolatry, but creation. He created these things. He created us with those kinds of needs that he himself would meet only in the sense of giving them to us, but not being them for us.
So, question. Should we say: God is enough? Or I don’t need anything more than God. And there is a good reason why those statements stick in our craw. I can tell they do by this question. They do in mine. Why do they sound belittling to God when we say them? God is not enough or I don’t need any... I have got enough. I don’t need God. The reason is that one of the most important teachings of the Bible is that when all our human needs go unmet and we are utterly alone and on the brink of death, God will never fail us. And in that moment he will be enough. That is what we mean when we honor God by saying he is all I need. In other words, if all my needs fail to be met, he will never fail. That is the point of Romans 8:35. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword? The point of that list is that all that ... all those God given needs, they are real needs for life and for obedience. All of those God given needs may fail. Famine may take food away. Nakedness may take clothing away. Sword may take life and limb away. In other words, every good and perfect gift that God has given us to need in one sense is being shown in this moment not to be needed ultimately.
When a Dog question thyself, What happens to me? To be With or Without Master!!!
Then God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” So out of the ground God had formed every kind of animal and brought them to the man to see what he would call them.
Whatever the man called the animals, that was their name. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.
So God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and took one of his ribs and made it into a woman and brought her to the man.
Why would Adam dream of a partner? Is that a choice?
Freedom means freedom to lie, curse, vilify, insult, belittle and so on. Adam had the freedom to dream on something he had been longing for. Is Adam's dream considered as a lust or a love? Did a creator implant into Adam this dreams?
What if by bringing Adam the animals “two by two,” as it were, God was showing him not only that he has an authority over these animals, but that there is a fundamental need of the two sexes for each other? You see, the other animals had a completeness Adam did not have. The man had no complement, no “helper.” The text gives us a strong clue that this is the moral of the story: “But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.” In the naming of the animals, God was drawing Adam’s attention to an arrangement, a norm.
Only after Adam realizes that he is missing out on the fullness of God’s male-and-female design do we read: “So God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and took one of his ribs and made it into a woman and brought her to the man.” Immediately, as the direct result of God’s creation, the text says: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” This one-fleshness and rich otherness, this cleaving and completing and complementing of being male and female, is paradigmatic of human flourishing.
By spacing out the creation of Adam and Eve, God was also drawing Adam’s attention to the gift of Eve. Failing to notice a gift dishonors it … and the giver. But to turn the gift in your hands, to say, “This is beautiful”—this honors the gift and the giver. Maybe this is what God was trying to teach Adam in delaying the gift of Eve: Notice the gift. Be astonished by it. Be glad for it, and care about it. To treasure the gift is the greatest gift Adam can give in return. And to remember what the gift is for—enjoying and sharing the beauty of the Lord. “You are worthy, O Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being” (Rev. 4:11).
A Choice and A Freewill do not apply. There is no choice and no freewill. That is what you were born into and that is what you will remain as until the day you die. It is like in the old days when you were born of slave parents then you, too, are a slave. You are not a freeman or freewoman. A Creator Is the Master whereby All its Creations are supposedly en-slaved till Judgement Day!!!
Till the day of Judgement are we all slaves. And, as a slave, you become the property of the slave owner who can do whatever he or she likes with you. In Islam, it is haram to have extramarital sex. However, it is halal to have extramarital sex with your slave because a slave is your property and you can do what you like with your property.
For example, if you have had sex with your slave and then you hand your slave to your son then you must inform your son so that he does not also have sex with that slave. A son cannot have sex with a slave whom the father has already had sex with.
Why are there so many slaves today?
Slavery is big business. Globally, slavery generates as much as $150bn (£116bn) in profits every year, more than one third of which ($46.9bn) is generated in developed countries, including the EU. Whereas slave traders two centuries ago were forced to contend with costly journeys and high mortality rates, modern exploiters have lower overheads thanks to huge advances in technology and transportation. Modern migration flows also mean that a large supply of vulnerable, exploitable people can be tapped into for global supply chains in the agriculture, beauty, fashion and sex industries.
According to slavery expert Siddharth Kara, modern slave traders now earn up to 30 times more than their 18th and 19th century counterparts would have done. The one-off cost of a slave today is $450, Kara estimates. A forced labourer generates roughly $8,000 in annual profit for their exploiter, while sex traffickers earn an average of $36,000 per victim.
“It turns out that slavery today is more profitable than I could have imagined,” Kara said. “Profits on a per-slave basis can range from a few thousand dollars to a few hundred thousand dollars a year, with total annual slavery profits estimated to be as high as $150bn.”It’s important to acknowledge that global population rates also affect estimates: the top 10 countries with the highest estimated absolute number of victims are also some of the most populous. Together, these 10 countries – China, Democratic Republic of the Congo, India, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, the Philippines and Russia – comprise 60% of all the people living in modern slavery, as well as more than half the world’s population, according to the Global Slavery Index.
Freedom of Thoughts - According to the Abrahamic faiths, you may not think anything opposite to what God says you must think. You may also not express these deviant thoughts. And even if you are thinking them without saying it, and the religious authorities suspect you are thinking the wrong thing, you can still be punished. And any Jew, Christian or Muslim who tells you otherwise is either a liar or ignorant about his or her own religion.
Christians still regarded Catholics as heretics and vice versa. The fact that they would say Christians and Catholics showed that non-Catholics did not regard Catholics as Christians (while Catholics also did not regard non-Catholics as Christians as well). As such the terms "Heresy and Apostasy" are forbidden not only in Islam but in Judaism and Christianity as well. If you read the Scriptures of the Old Testament, it is very clear that God commanded that all non-believers (infidels), heretics, apostates, etc., must be killed. You not only kill these people but the entire community plus all the animals in that community must be exterminated.
Basically, the Bible propagates ethnic cleansing and Moses was commanded to do so, and which he did. No doubt some Christians try to fool us by saying that this may have been true as far as the Old Testament is concerned but the New Testament no longer tells Christians to do this. They tell us that the New Testament teaches peace, love, tolerance and forgiveness, opposite to what the Old Testament teaches. But this is not true and those Christians who say this either do not know their own religion or are trying to kid themselves, or fool us.
Jesus made it very clear that he did not come to introduce a new religion but to confirm the old laws. And this is exactly what Prophet Muhammad said as well. Hence both Christianity and Islam follow the Old Testament laws of death to infidels, heretics and apostates. We talk about human rights and civil liberties. We propagate freedom of choice, thought, expression, belief, association, etc. God, however, does not allow this. God has decided what we can and cannot believe, say and do. And if we violate these commands of God then we must be punished.
Hence if you wish to have independent thought you cannot believe in religion. If you believe in religion then you are not allowed independent thought but can only believe what God says you are allowed to believe. And if you believe otherwise you must be punished.
The believers and followers of the Abrahamic faiths worship and pray to this God that allows slavery. The believers and followers of the Abrahamic faiths worship and pray to this God that allows some people to get rich from the misery of others. What is wrong with the Jews, Christians and Muslims? My Ohh My...
Slavery Is A Norm.... My Ohh My!!!
Some people may view slavery as immoral. It is certainly illegal in many countries although it is still secretly done in some parts of the world, mainly in the prostitution trade. But it is not immoral or illegal according to religion.
As far as the Semitic religions or the Abrahamic faiths of Judeo-Christianity and Islam are concerned, slavery is both legal and moral.
The Bible (both the Old and New Testaments) as well as the Qur’an and Hadith talk about slavery. And slavery is provided for in the Semitic religions. Islam believes there are 124,000 prophets since the beginning of time and 25 of those Prophets are mentioned by name in the Qur’an. And both the Bible and Qur’an testify that even the Prophets owned slaves.
Slaves are not only legal but you can also have sex with your slaves. That is not considered adultery and the Bible and Qur’an say so. And the common patriarch of the Abrahamic faiths, the Prophet Abraham, himself had sex with his wife’s slave who bore a child named Ishmael, or Ismail to the Muslims. And Ismail, the son of this slave, is the patriarch of Islam while his brother Isaac (Ishaq to the Muslims) is the patriarch of Judaism.
Jews, Christians and Muslims will tell us that their religions are religions of peace and love. At the same time, however, their holy books tell us that their Prophets declared war on the ‘enemies of God’ and they killed all the men they defeated (the prisoners of war) and took their women and children as slaves. And this, according to their religions, is the booty or profits of war.
Hence there is no Geneva Convention as far as the Semitic religions are concerned. Prisoners of war are butchered and their women and children are taken as profits of war and subjected to slavery. And this is not what I say. This is what their holy books say. I am just quoting what their holy books say. Is this the same God and the same Jesus that allows whites to enslave blacks? Where is the kindness in this? Where is the love in this? Where is the compassion in this? Where is the fairness in this? Where is the justice in this?
Slavery is worse than death. I would rather die than to be enslaved and treated worse than an animal. If I were to be captured as a slave I would kill myself than be subjected to a life of slavery. And yet God created some humans to be slaves of other humans. If that is the reason God created me then why create me in the first place?
We are told good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell. But then some people are sent to hell on earth just so that others may get rich from slave labour. What is wrong with this God? Is this the mark of a compassionate, kind, just, fair, loving, etc., God that they keep talking about? I do not see a God that allows slavery as being a good God that you tell me He is.
The believers and followers of the Abrahamic faiths worship and pray to this God that allows slavery. The believers and followers of the Abrahamic faiths worship and pray to this God that allows some people to get rich from the misery of others. What is wrong with the Jews, Christians and Muslims?
I want out
To live my life alone
I want out
Leave me be I want out
To do things on my own
I want out T
o live my life and to be free!!!
To Be With Or Without Master!!!! When a Dog question thyself, What happens to me? To be With or Without Master!!! #with #without #master