Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Mosque at Ground Zero

I really was shocked when i first heard about this. I don't understand how it could be allowed to get this far. If Rudy Guiliani were the major
i bet it would have been stopped long ago. It is obvious it is meant as a slap in our faces. Our enemies will indeed be laughing at us if it does get built and dedicated on the tenth anniversary
of 9-11. Doesn't the date it is to be dedicated
confirm that? I really don't understand why people think it is a religious freedom issue. There are hundreds of mosques in the New York area. Anyway, most Americans agree with me.
Rassmusen polls shows 61 percent of New Yorkers
oppose.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/61-new-
yorkers-oppose-ground-zero-mosque
54 % nationally oppose vs 20 %
http://therightfieldline.blogspot.com/2010/07/rasmussen-54-oppose-stealth-jihads.html

Swinging by really quickly to post a link -- Rac, that was a very thought-provoking reply and I don't want to answer it too quickly. Actually, I'm not sure I need to add anything.

But, for the sake of understanding different perspectives...

From the Washington Post: A Muslim Victim of 9/11: \'Build Your Mosque Somewhere Else\'

Read the whole thing, it's thoughtful and touching. Her mother was on one of the planes that hit the towers.

PJ

It is a touching piece, Pam. And of all the arguments against the community center and mosque, the point that Ground Zero is the final resting place of thousands of bodies that were not and could not be recovered is the most salient one. But I'm reminded that Ground Zero is not going to remain a graveyard forever. They're going to put a giant, gleaming glass and steel skyscraper on it. People will go to work there again. They will buy coffee at a Starbucks that I'm certain will be in the building's ground floor, along with a Cosi sandwich shop. Across the street there is, and always will be, the Century 21 Discount Department Store. A block away is a University of Phoenix office building. American Express sits opposite Ground Zero, close to the waterfront. All sorts of buildings that are profane in the oldest sense of the word (i.e., not sacred), mark the grounds in visual range of Ground Zero. The mosque and community center will be several blocks away, in the middle of a block and will therefore have no line of site to Ground Zero. You won't be standing on consecrated ground with a giant minaret staring you in the face.

Okay, Rac, now I have some time... first off, I agree with you about standards in the Koran (and the Torah, for that matter) being improvements on previous conditions. An eye for an eye sounds bad to us moderns, but it's better than killing a whole family over it.

I want to make the point that I *do* believe we should be tolerant of all faiths. I'm not really suggesting that Islam be treated here like Christianity is in Saudi Arabia. You're right, we're better than that. It's just that knowing about their total lack of tolerance makes their demands for our tolerance seem extremely irritating. But I support everyone's right to be irritating; I may need it myself one day.

I appreciate the insights into Middle Eastern culture - very interesting contradictions. They seem to have a very blinkered view of us. I expect their governments foster that.

I hadn't heard the notion that Muhammad was in the Bible. I can see that they'd like to believe that. They also, I'm told, are taught that Jesus didn't actually die on the cross, just, you know, swooned. Anyway, yeah, be careful how you argue with people, but I appreciate that you're trying.

Hopefully not many, but yeah. That was a really really stupid thing for them to say; the Old Testament has God smiting the unbelievers, but these days he's got other methods of dealing with them -- non-violent methods. Our pastor has preached a few sermons refuting the notion that, say, Hurricane Katrina was divine justice, not that I think that view was prevalent in the church. But apparently he'd gotten some emails... anyway, Christians are *commanded* to love everybody (hate the sin, love the sinner, etc) but human beings just keep failing that test.

That's a fair point, although I don't know what they're ever going to build on that site since it's been nine years and nothing's been done. Hopefully a memorial will be built. Still, Starbucks wasn't even remotely complicit in the act of war that killed all those people. So that's not the same thing.

The reason I came here today is to share this opinion piece I read in the Ottowa Citizen . Written by two Muslims who say, among other things:

It's not the existence of a mosque that bothers me, it's the spitefulness that seems to be a large factor of the whole thing that I object to. If the organizers truly want to improve community relations, they should show more compassion and respect for the community. There's a very large wound there, still, and these guys are gleefully adding salt.

PJ

If you talk to law enforcement officials, they will tell you that one of the best places to convert non-believers to Islam is the American prison system.

Most of the men in prison (I'm referring to the long-term guests of the state here) are cut off from positive influences both inside and outside the walls of the prison. It's no wonder that chaplains of all faiths are able to report significant numbers of converts.

And I hasten to add that the majority of the Muslim chaplains in American prisons have no desire to lead their converts to blow themselves up in police stations or supermarkets when they get out. Most Muslim chaplains are much more concerned with helping their converts become peaceful and productive members of the community when their sentences are up.

The problem is that there are a small minority of Muslim chaplains who either point their converts toward radical Islam or direct them to radical Imams when the prisoners are released. I don't know of any Christian or Jewish chaplains who have ever done this. (See this example or this one or this one .)

To those who would take the position that any faith which brings peace to prison yards and hope for a better life to the prisoners inside is a good thing, I must provisionally agree. Prisons are too violent a place for most men and women who have any desire to build a better life (hence the original name 'penitentiary,' meaning 'a place to repent'). But if even one percent of these Muslim prison missionaries are making converts with the aim of using these people to incite more violence, it's too many.

And let's make certain we get the full context of the late Jerry Falwell's comments here. Dr. Falwell told CNN
What Falwell said, however, actually dovetails quite nicely with what Dinesh D'Souza wrote in his book "The Enemy At Home." In it, D'Souza asserts that what most Arabs (Muslims and non-Muslims alike) hate about America is the rampant consumerism and what they view as our immoral lifestyles, combined with our apparent insistence in forcibly exporting that lifestyle all over the world. And he makes a pretty convincing argument.

Terry, he explicitly "pointed a finger" (his words, not mine) in my face and the faces of people like me and said "you helped this happen." He declared that the blood of 2500 of my fellow New Yorkers, and another 500 of my countrymen is partly on my hands because I have the audacity to be a feminist and a liberal. He only took it back when the rest of civilized society screamed bloody murder. I'm not going to apologize for my beliefs and I don't believe Mr. Falwell was sincere when he recanted. The words first spoken, I believe, indicate the level of contempt he had for people like me.

I actually found D'Souza's argument to just be a baseless screed against the horrible dangers of people who dare to disagree with him. I've actually managed to forget most of the details of D'Souza's book, so thankfully the Washington Post's review was there to refresh my recollection. As the Post pointed out, there are horrible inaccuracies in his book - there are American troops in Mecca, Mr. D'Souza? Qaddafi stopped sponsoring terrorism in 1986, two years before the Lockerbie bombing? And D'Souza ignores every scrap of evidence that flatly contradicts his theory to make up an explanation out of whole cloth that not only explains the motivations of terrorists, but also conveniently blames it all on D'Souza's political enemies at home. Those awful, scary, evil, liberals.

The simple fact is that Northern Europe is way more liberal and secular than we are. So why didn't al Qaeda attack Sweden? Because Sweden doesn't have a blue water navy that covers the world, or bases on every continent. Sweden isn't seen as the principal power behind every government in the Arab world that al Qaeda hates. Sweden didn't have tens of thousands of troops based in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East's most sinister conspiracy theorists didn't spread the filthy lie that Israel is nothing more than a colonial outpost of Sweden, designed to take over and subjugate the Arab world.

We are hated because we are powerful. We are hated because our presence is felt all over the world. We are hated because if your government is incompetent and exploits its people and squanders its resources, it's much easier to blame some looming foreign hegemon with corrupt and sinister designs than to admit that people who don't demand better from their government often get pretty lousy leadership.

Don't get me wrong, they hate capitalism and consumerism, and liberalism and tolerance and feminism. But if the reason they attacked us was any of these, why didn't they bomb the French Riviera for its topless beaches? Or Rwanda, for having the audacity not just to let women vote, but for having a majority female parliament?

They don't even really care about the oppression of other Muslims. If they did, why wouldn't they attack China for its massive human rights violations against the Uighurs? Or France (yet again) for not just colonizing and exploiting the Muslim world, but for engaging in race and religion baiting vis a vis its own Arab/Muslim population?

It all comes down to power, not US domestic politics. The former chief of the CIA's bin Laden unit said it a lot better than I could: "Bin Laden has been precise in telling America the reasons he is waging war on us. None of the reasons have anything to do with our freedom, liberty, and democracy, but have everything to do with U.S. policies and actions in the Muslim world."

Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda tried to directly take on the governments in the Arab world that they hate. They failed. In the age of modern weaponry, after all, psycho fringe groups generally have a hard time overthrowing well armed, entrenched establishments. The fanatics then decided the best way to get these governments to collapse was to force the US to abandon its support for them. Without the US military there to protect the status quo, they wagered, eventually these unpopular governments could be toppled. This isn't mere speculation. Bin Laden himself, in his rambling, poorly written declarations, has laid out his "case" against the "near enemy" (i.e., the Arab governments) and the "far enemy" (i.e., America).

Bin Laden and his thugs thought that by attacking the US on its own soil, it would cause the "paper tiger" to retreat. They used the fiasco in Mogadishu, the USS Cole attack, and the attacks on our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya as exhibits A, B, C, and D in their case that if you hit the US forcefully, it would always retreat. They apparently didn't account for the fact that the US might react differently to being attacked at home.

Sorry if this comes across as overly touchy. I just get a little bent out of shape when people like D'Souza try to blame anyone but the totalitarian psychopaths who want to enforce their 7th century form of warlord driven barbarism on the rest of the world for the events of 9/11.

Rac

Here's another point on which you and I totally agree. When I hear the Saudis talk about "hurt feelings" over contentious religious issues and how other people aren't respectful enough of Islam, it makes my eyes roll so far back I'm afraid my retinas will detach. Your tolerance for cognitive dissonance has to be pretty high when dealing with them. Maybe it makes me a bad person, but I spend a lot of the time thinking to myself, "my God, I'm glad we're not like you."

And yes, there is a verse in the Quran in which God tells Jesus, (paraphrased) "you will be crucified, but you won't die, I'll just make everyone think you died."

I do appreciate that many (if not all) Christians heed the fact that we're supposed to love one another. Sometimes when it feels like I'm fighting an uphill battle over here, I try to remember my favorite verse from the New Testament: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God."

Is the mosque and community center near Ground Zero meant to be mischief making? I don't know. I don't know what's going on in the thoughts of its supporters. I don't know if they're sincere in saying that they need more space and there is a demand and need in the community (like I said before, there is a substantial Muslim community in the neighborhood and they have been holding prayers in that building for some time). But I do know that I believe government has no business trying to stop the project. Maybe a dialogue should have been opened up in terms of finding a place that would serve the Muslim community's needs, meet the physical requirements such a space would require, and would still serve the purpose of an inter-faith dialogue without setting off the really contentious debate that we got. Truthfully, though, finding good real estate in Manhattan (especially an entire 13 story building) is extraordinarily difficult. There might not have been another suitable space in the neighborhood.

Finally, a recent Duke Study has shown that American mosques actually serve to de-radicalize Muslims in the US. The outreach and community building initiatives undertaken by many American imams has served to combat the sense of alienation that often leads youth to become violent extremists. All the protests I'm seeing against mosques across the country are really disheartening. If we put Muslim communities on the defensive and treat them like they're not welcome in America, it'll serve to undermine any efforts by moderate imams to combat radicalization.

Rac

I forgot to mention that Sunday on the morning
news shows they interviewed a New York City
construction worker who openly states he would
refuse to work on the project. He is also encouraging other construction workers to pledge
not to work on it also. He said he has gotten
a lot of positive agreement from fellow workers.
Also i forgot to mention that the Iman who is
trying to do this has made very anti American incendiary statements including one in September 2001 not long after 9-11. I've listened to them.
He is not some innocent peace loving Iman .

That's understandable. I don't know what's really going on inside your head any more than you know what's going on inside mine. But to make this reasonable statement and then refuse to accept Dr. Falwell's apology strikes me as a little bit uneven.

One thing I haven't seen discussed in this thread is Iman Faisal Abdul Rauf and his refusal to declare that no funds from any terrorist groups will be used to pay for the construction and/or operation of this mosque. He has also refused more than once to label Hamas as a terrorist organization.

These positions might be political in nature, i.e., he doesn't want to offend anyone in his community. But it puts up another little red flag in the line of sight and gives many people pause.

It should also be noted that this proposed mosque is not a brand-new congregation, but a larger facility for an existing group. Either there are more Muslims coming to that part of New York to live and worship or there are more converts to Islam from the surrounding neighborhoods.

The answer is that neither Sweden nor France nor Rwanda are forcibly exporting their culture to the Middle East. There aren't many French-made TV programs or movies sent to that part of the world every year, but there are scads of US video products inundating the Arab world on a daily basis. You can legitimately argue that the people there don't have to watch or listen to that media, but I know who Paris Hilton and the Kardashian sisters are even though I make no attempt to follow their adventures. I can't imagine what a straight-laced Arab man would think of his teen-aged daughter trying to act like Lady Gaga. I absolutely do NOT condone honor killings or any punishment short of death but in the spirit of honor killing (imprisonment at home or town jail, public whippings, and the like), but I do understand such a man's frustration.

In one way, it doesn't even matter if it was meant to be mischief-making. Mischief has clearly been made -- tons of public opposition -- regardless of whether that was the initial purpose. Their actions now (plowing ahead with it despite loud protests) do *not* display any desire to build bridges. Quite the opposite, really.

It's not about making it illegal. Just because something is legal doesn't make it a good idea. There are tons of things I could do that would be legal, but still be really, really stupid.

PJ

I have stayed out of this discussion for a whole number of reasons, among them that I think that Ground Zero is an extremely American site, so what should happen there should be a discussion for Americans among themselves. I still think so, but a few things have been said here that I must protest against.

Terry, I understand and share your concern about Muslim proselytizing in prisons. That really happens in many Western countries. I really think that in many cases inmates are being told, either by imams or by fellow inmates, that they have been unfairly treated by a godless western society, and the right way for them to regain their human dignity is to fight against the western society in the name of Islam. So far there have been extremely few cases anywhere in the west where former prisoners have actually carried out terror attacks against their own country in the name of Islam - I'm not sure there has been a single such attack that can be directly linked to proselytizing in prisons - but I think that this is a real concern anyway, since many frustrated prisoners may be happy to find a "legitimate" reason to get back at society. I don't know how that can be addressed, but I agree that the problem should be taken seriously. (Although I don't see how proselytizing in prisons has anything to do with whether or not there should be a mosque at Ground Zero.)

But I react very strongly when people try to blame 9/11 in itself on America's supposedly too liberal and feminist culture. To me, that suggestion is a very severe attack on the democratic, liberal, secular society that I want to live in. Why do I want to live in the west and not in a Muslim country? It is because here in the west I am allowed to be an individual and make my own choices. I am allowed to search for my own answers. I have the right to be treated as a human being even though I am a woman. I am nobody's property but a subject of my own.

I think that suggestions from people like Jerry Falwell and Dinesh D'Souza is an attack on precisely the human rights that set the west apart from almost all of the Muslim world. I feel that the goals of people like Falwell are sometimes too similar to those of conservative Muslims. It has to do with establishing a society where mighty men explain and enforce the will of God on not-so-mighty men and women on the Earth. Part of explaining the will of God is almost always to make sure that woman must be subordinate to man.

Terry, in explaining why 9/11 happened in the first place, you named several American women, Paris Hilton, the Kardashian sisters (whom I have never heard about) and Lady Gaga:

Are you serious about this, Terry? 9/11 happened because of Paris Hilton, the Kardashian sisters and Lady Gaga?

You talked about straight-laced Arab men and the frustration they have to suffer when their daughters try to imitate Lady Gaga. Are you seriously suggesting that the most effective way for America to protect itself from further attacks is to make sure that America has no more Paris Hiltons, Kardashian sisters or Lady Gagas?

You talked about the straight-laced Arab man, whose frustrations you sympathized with. Well, yesterday there was a documentary on Swedish TV where you could see such a straight-laced frustrated Arab man. The documentary was about two young gay Swedish people of Arab descent who had received death threats from their own families because of their sexual orientation. I am going to post a Youtube video which is entirely in Swedish with clips from this documentary, so that you can, at least, look at the young gay man and the young gay woman and see an interview with the woman's stepfather. The stepfather left Sweden after twenty-five years in our country, because he felt that his daughter had shamed him so badly that he couldn't live here anymore.

In the end of the video, the stepfather is heard saying this:

"To me, she is not a human being. She is worse than an animal. I say, animals don't do what Cherin does. She is not a human being and she is not an animal. She is worse."

Worse than animals

But the stepfather didn't threaten to gather his own army or to found his own Al Qaeda force to attack Sweden in retaliation for humiliating him by protecting his shameless stepdaughter. So, Terry, did bin Laden's men attack America in retaliation for being humiliated by Paris Hilton? Or did Jerry Falwell and Dinesh D'Souza just put forth this theory in the hopes that they could do what straight-laced Arab men can do, namely punish unruly women who aren't sufficiently subordinate to them?

Ann

Terry, he gave a milquetoast apology saying "I would never blame anyone except the terrorists..." Guess what, Mr. Falwell, you did. You said "you helped this happen." Then he concluded: "...if I left that impression, I apologize." What sort of impression was he trying to leave when he said "you helped this happen?" Had he made a more forceful apology or actually retracted his words, maybe I would have believed him.

And since I happen to live in the Muslim world, I can tell you France exports tons of its culture here. And Arab pop music videos are just as racy and ridiculous as the ones exported from America. I've lived with Muslim families, I've broken bread with many more. I've seen how they interact with their children. And when they tell me what makes them mad about America it's always - 'why did you sanction Iraq and let hundreds of thousands of children die from hunger and disease?' or 'why do you support Israel when it abuses the rights of the Palestinians?' or 'why do your predator drones kill so many women and children at weddings and in their homes in Afghanistan?' It's not - why do you send us Lady GaGa? Sure, the extremists are always ranting about moral decay and decadence, but the average Arab or Muslim I've interacted with doesn't give a damn about High School Musical or Brittany Spears. But despite the fact that every military intervention undertaken by NATO has been done to save Muslims, many honestly believe the US and the West are militantly hostile to the Muslim world.

Rac

I have not replied until now because I wanted to give myself time to digest the replies I've received in this thread. And I wanted to make sure I replied in a thoughtful and careful manner. I do not want to say or do anything out of anger or irritation, because that doesn't resolve anything.

Let me reply, in no particular order, to some of the comments directed my way.

Ann wrote:
No, I didn't. All of these ladies were teenagers and not prominent in the news in 2001. There is no way anyone could reasonably blame them for anything which happened nine years ago. You are either not reading my statements carefully, Ann, or you are putting words in my mouth so you can refute something I didn't say.

I was trying to use those women as examples of the culture Americans often seem to want to export. Paris Hilton is famous for her family and her heritage and her explicit sex videos, Lady Gaga (real name Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta - no wonder she picked a new stage name) is famous for her music and her outrageous antics in real life and in her videos, and the Kardashian sisters (as far as I am aware) are famous for having Paris Hilton as a sometime BFF (Best Friend Forever - they really haven't done anything worthy of note on their own, except for having some famous boyfriends).

Ann also wrote:
You missed that one too. I am not greatly concerned with Muslim proselytizing in general (even in prisons), but I am concerned about the small percentage of Muslim prison chaplains who seek converts for violent ends. The vast majority do not do so, at least not as far as my (limited) research has shown.

Ann also wrote:
Wrong.

Dr. Falwell did not advocate a theological takeover of the government. What he advocated was that men and women with Biblical values be the ones who make the laws and the judicial decisions in the US. D'Souza advocates much the same thing. Dr. Falwell wanted an America where the people choose to follow Biblical precepts, not one where everyone is forced to do so.

And I can hear the objection already. "If those Bible-believing people get into government, then the preachers will run the country through them!" Not if they stick to Biblical values, because the Bible is available to everyone, and everyone can open it and point to a passage which will either support or refute a particular preacher's opinion.

As Rac pointed out earlier, it's not that way in the Muslim world.
We don't. All we have to do is read it.

The famous phrase concerning the "wall of separation between church and state" was penned by Thomas Jefferson in the first year of his presidency. He wrote to a group of Christian pastors in New England to assure them that the Federal government would not interfere with the administration of their churches. This was never written in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution. The US government was based on Biblical principles, one of which is that preachers don't make the laws and the lawmakers don't appoint the preachers.

Rac, I bow to your superior personal experience with the people with whom you have interacted. And I admit that my opinions on Middle East policy are based on information provided to me by others, so it gets filtered at least twice. I should have been more careful.

I have to remind you, though, that most Americans are pretty leery of the Muslim faith and its practitioners. And it's not hard to figure out why. We hear, almost on a daily basis, that some Muslim sect or sub-sect has set off a bomb in Pakistan or Iraq or Afghanistan specifically to kill other Muslims. You never hear of Baptists bombing Methodists, or Methodists shooting Episcopalians, or Episcopalians killing Lutherans - you get the idea. And if someone wants to bring up Northern Ireland, remember that the conflict there was as much about armed rebellion against a (perceived) unjust and invasive government as it was a religious conflict. In fact, there are a great many parallels between those two conflicts, as well as many striking differences.

We also don't ambush and murder Muslim medical aid workers and use the excuse that they were carrying copies of the Quran and trying to convert our citizens. The Taliban (who, I know, represent only a small political minority in Afghanistan) did exactly that early last week. And while the Taliban is striving for political control of Afghanistan, they are driven by radical Muslim theological doctrine. That scares a lot of Americans.

Your point, Rac, that the US is not only exporting its culture to the Middle East and upsetting many conservatives there (both devout Muslims and others) but projects a strong military presence there is quite valid. We are indeed hated (and feared, I believe) because we are strong. And we have to deal with the fallout of our ventures, whether they are intended as peaceful assistance, as in Haiti following the earthquake, or in Iraq, to topple a violent and murderous dictator and free a nation.

And your point that other nations export potentially offensive media to the Middle East without suffering major reprisal campaigns is also valid. But from my own reading and from your comments, I get the distinct impression that the people in the Middle East perceive (rightly or wrongly) that the US is the ultimate source of that material. So we get the blame - and the rocket-propelled grenades.

To get back to the original point of this thread, I'm not in favor of the mosque in New York near Ground Zero. But not because I hate or fear Muslims. It's because I am not confident that it is intended to be a house of worship and not a recruiting center for radical Muslims.

Terry said: Indeed you did. You mentioned four females as examples of a pernicious American culture that makes America hated abroad, but you didn't mention a single male person. I can only conclude, Terry, that just like so many conservative Muslims, you too think that the "shamelessness of women" poses a great threat to society. It is not too farfetched to conclude that you would like to rein in and control women, perhaps in a way reminiscent of how the Arab-Muslim culture reins in and controls the overwhelming majority of its women. (I note that you felt sympathy, or at least understanding, for the frustration of the Arab man who might contemplate honor-killing his daughter for imitating Lady Gaga.)

Of course I can't know that you want to control women in the same way that women are controlled in Muslim countries, but your reasoning at least supports the possibility that this is what you would like to do.

It is not for me to say what sort of government America should have. However...

As you know, Terry, I have read the Bible quite carefully, particularly the passages that have to do with the treatment and general standing of women. I think that there is very little in the Bible that is not compatible with the often very harsh treatment of women in the Muslim world.



Could the Bible be used to make Christian women veil themselves? No, not if we are talking about face-covering veils like this one, but other kinds of veils, certainly. There are definitely biblical passages that require women to dress modestly, and in Corinthians 11, Paul demands that women cover their heads, at least when they pray:

It should be noted that the Koran does not explicitly demand that women must cover their heads. So the Bible is no better than the Koran in this matter.

So what about polygamy?



Would the Bible allow a man to have four wives, in the same way that Muslim men are allowed to have four wives? Certainly! The New Testament doesn't explicitly allow it, but nowhere does it forbid it, either.

What about woman's obedience to her husband?



Could the Bible be used to require women to obey their husbands? Oh, yes! Paul goes on about woman's duty to obey her husband over and over in his letters!

But surely honor killings could never be justified by the Bible?



Actually, it is at least possible that the Bible could be used to legitimize honor killings. In Genesis 38, Judah orders his widowed daughter-in-law Tamar to be executed, because she has become pregnant without his permission. The fact that he spares her life has little do with the fact that he finds proof that he himself is in fact the father of her child(ren), and it is more a consequence of an obscure Israeli law that gave a widow like Tamar the right to ask for a child by one of her husband's relatives under certain circumstances.

Even more interesting is a passage in Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy 22:13-21, which actually requires that a new bride who does not bleed on her wedding night sheet must be stoned to death by the men in her town. Didn't Jesus repeal that law when he saved the woman accused of adultery? Not necessarily. First, Jesus didn't say that the stoning of women would be forbidden from now on. And second, some scholars question whether that passage about Jesus and the widow is authentic at all, or if it is a made-up addition to the Gospels.

Could a girl be sure that she would be allowed to choose her own husband in a society ruled by the Bible?

An arranged marriage

The Bible makes it very clear that arranged marriages were the custom in those days, and nowhere does it say that such an arrangement is forbidden. The Bible also doesn't contain a single story of a young girl who defies her father by refusing to marry the suitor he has chosen for her. So if we are to live like they do in the Bible, arranged marriages would be a natural thing.

In a society ruled by the Bible, Terry, women would not necessarily have any more rights than they have in a typical Muslim society.

Ann

Oh, Pam, I'm trying to remember what exactly you and I disagree about.

The above is also, I believe, the mathematical contra-positive of something I tend to say a lot - Stupid isn't illegal.

Rac

Ann wrote:
You may have read the Bible, Ann, but you don't understand it. How do I know? Because you read my words and you didn't understand them.

You are putting words in my mouth - again. You have accused me of attitudes I do not possess. You have all but made up out of whole cloth an accusation that I'd like to "rein in and control" women in today's society. I assure you that I do not control my wife or my daughters.

If that accusation were true, why do I hang around a message board where the majority of the regular participants are female? I can guarantee you that I don't control a single one of the ladies on this board. And I am insulted by your insinuation that I "felt understanding" for the Arab man who might be tempted to honor-kill his daughter. My understanding is for his frustration for his daughter acting like Gaga, NOT for his desire to kill her.

Whatever else you might say in this thread, I would very much appreciate a direct apology from you on this subject.

Does the Bible require that a woman obey her husband? Yes. Does the Bible require that a man love his wife in a sacrificial manner, putting her needs and desires before his own? Yes, and the paired requirements are in the same passage in Ephesians chapter 5. You are, once again, cherry-picking Bible verses to support your position and dismissing those which do not. This is not an intellectually honest way to discuss an issue.

Does the New Testament forbid polygamy? No. However, Jesus said on several occasions that the one-man-one-woman marriage for life was God's plan. And Paul forbid the brand-new churches in Asia from calling pastors (bishops in some translations) or deacons who had more than one wife. Clearly the ideal is one husband and one wife.

This one, though, makes my teeth grind.
If that isn't twisting the narrative to fit your preconceived ideas, I don't know what is.

Tamar was not spared due to some obscure Israeli law. At that time, there was no law given to Israel. Tamar and Judah were operating under a much older set of tribal (NOT national) laws, ones which were designed to protect a childless widow from being alone and destitute in her old age. At that time, children were expected to provide for their aged mothers after their fathers were either dead or unable to provide. As a childless widow, Tamar would have been destined for a life of uncertainty at best and grinding poverty at worst. Judah had denied her the comfort of a child to take care of her in her old age, so she resorted to subterfuge to obtain a child from Judah himself.

And this one:
Gah.

The Bible is not a book designed to change cultures or societies. It is a book intended to show that man is incomplete without the Lord, and that the Lord has taken the necessary steps to bring both parties back together. Even today, many societies which are not Muslim arrange marriages between young men and women. You speak as if choosing one's mate is the natural way and the best way to do it. It ain't necessarily so.

One more:
Really? Mary, the mother of Jesus, is given a position of honor in Christianity. She is a major player in the story of Jesus, while her husband Joseph barely pokes his head above the ground and is never quoted. The first witnesses to the resurrection were women, not matter which Gospel account you read. Women are prominently mentioned throughout the New Testament as people who were just as important as any man (such as Aquila and his wife Priscilla, Lydia the seller of purple in Phillipi, Apphia the wife of Philemon). Your assertion that Christianity does not treat women well does not hold up to close examination.

The Bible tells us that we are supposed to tell the truth to everyone all the time. The Bible tells us that we are supposed to deal honestly and equitably with all people. The Bible tells us we are supposed to live peaceful lives. The Bible tells us that we are supposed to remain faithful to and love our spouses. The Bible tells us that we are supposed to love and provide for our children. And if everyone in the US lived like this, we'd have a lot less to talk about on the evening news.

Oh yes, she was, Terry. The Bible makes it very clear.

Fulfill your duty to her as a brother-in-law to produce offspring for your brother. That is pretty clear. If that was just some obscure tribal law that God didn't like, the Bible should have commented on the undesirability of this law.

Onan refuses to do his duty, however:

Onan didn't do his duty, so God killed him.

But now that Judah had lost two sons who had tried to produce offspring with Tamar, he was afraid of letting her have offspring with his youngest son, even though she had that right according to the law.

Judah denies Tamar the right to have offspring by forcing her to live as a widow in his house.

Tamar covers her face and pretends to be a prostitute as she is waiting for Judah.

And Judah doesn't hesitate to ask for the service of a prostitute. So now Tamar might get pregnant. But she needs to get proof that it was Judah who slept with her.

Now Tamar has the proof that she needs. And she did indeed get pregnant.

Judah didn't hesitate to go to a prostitute himself. But if his daughter-in-law Tamar has prostituted herself, Judah can put her to death.

But Tamar has proof that she is pregnant by Judah.

So Judah doesn't kill her. And why not? Because he would go to a prostitiute himself, so he is no better than her? No, it is because he knows that the law of the land demanded that he give Tamar to his son Shelah. He refused to do it, so he broke the law, and Tamar got the offspring she was entitled to from Judah himself.

But under other circumstances the man who would go to a prostitute would certainly honor-kill his daughter-in-law if she prostituted herself.

I certainly stand by what I said in my previous post:
In my opinion, the fact that Christianity reveres one woman, Mary, most certainly doesn't guarantee that it will revere other women or even treat them well. It is not like other women will be the mother of Christ. Anyway, Terry, if we speak about the Bible only, Mary doesn't have a prominent position there at all, and Jesus himself never speaks of his mother as if she was something special. Luke 11:27-28 is typical:

And in Mark 3:31-34 Jesus comes close to denying that Mary is his mother:

And in John 2, Jesus speaks almost disrespectfully to Mary, as he calls her "woman" instead of "mother":

There are other passages in the Gospels where Mary is treated with more respect. But it is still true that she is not a central character in the Gospels, and she is not held up as an example for others to follow. Interestingly, Paul never mentions her once.

Terry, you also said:

You are right that an important distinction between the Bible and the Koran is that the Bible mentions several good and brave women who do what is right. In other words, there are several heroines in the Bible, and there are none in the Koran - none, interestingly, except Mary, the mother of Jesus. On the other hand, there are also many bad women in the Bible who do what is wrong, and some of them are horribly punished because of it. There are no stories in the Koran about bad women who get horribly punished.

You are quite right that the New Testament mentions Priscilla the wife of Aquila, Lydia the seller of purple in Phillipi and Apphia the wife of Philemon. I agree that it is a very good thing that the Bible mentions these good and active women, but it does not mean that the Bible puts women on a par with men and gives them the right to do the same thing as men. For a long time there was a bitter fight here in Sweden over whether women could be ordained as clergy. Today it is seen as a natural thing that women can be ministers and even bishops, but it was not so thirty years ago. Those who opposed female ministers argued that Jesus only chose male disciples, so only males are allowed to "represent" him. And recently, fascinatingly enough, the Pope condemned active pedophilia among priests by saying, in effect, that a priest who molests a child is as sinful as a woman who tries to be a priest.

So indeed, Terry, I stick by my assertion that a society ruled by the Bible might indeed oppress women as much as women are oppressed in most Muslim societies.

Ann

Point taken, Terry. I'm glad you cleared it up. And I apologize for thinking that you expressed any sympathy for such a father's desire to kill his daughter.

Ann

Ann

If a writer came onto these boards and wrote stories portraying Lois as mean, stupid, selfish, evil, or cruel, you would be the first one to protest and say that just because someone writes that, it doesn't make it true.

However, you are willing to judge God, the bible and Christianity by what others say. Sometimes well-meaning Christians have got it wrong. It happens. Sometimes, people calling themselves Christians have acted completely contrary to what the Bible teaches. This even happened in the Bible - people made mistakes, defied God, refused to do what they knew was right. This doesn't mean God approved of what they did.

Your comment about the pope - I didn't hear that, but if it's true - again you're judging God and Christianity by what someone else says about it.

For his time and in his culture, Jesus was radically respectful of women. Many women followed him. He didn't make them 'disciples' but can you imagine the furore if he'd chosen 12 women to be his closest companions?

He called his mother 'woman' which in our time and our culture sounds disrespectful - but are you sure it had the same connotations then? I've read that 'woman' was actually a term of respect.

In John 8, a woman was brought to Jesus accused of having been caught in adultery (I too have always wondered where the man was.) What did Jesus do? Did he pick up the first stone and throw it at her? No - he turned it back on her accusers and then told her that he didn't condemn her.

He made a stand *against* the sexism in the society that condemned the woman for her actions, but not the man.

Polygamy - The bible is clear that God's ideal for marriage is one man-one woman for life. However, God has allowed other situations. As I understand it, he allowed men to have multiple wives when the number of women far exceeded the number of men, due to men being killed in war.

Had it been the other way around, I'm sure people would have accused the bible of being sexist because of the stories where women risked their lives in trying to protect the men who stayed at home, and then expected the women lucky enough to survive the war to come home and take on the responsibility of feeding and caring for multiple men.

It's all in how you look at it.

Corrina.