The Extremist

Earlier I wrote about the Muslim who claimed that killing Westerners was simply part of the theology of Islam. Now there is this email that has been making its circulation enough to finally get to my doorstep. Being the email-skeptic that I am, I doubted its veracity ... until I found that it was confirmed rather than denied. So, rather than giving you the email version, you can see the Snopes version.

Basically what we have is an angry mob of Muslims who are expressing their view of those who disagree with Islam. Their position was that they recommended killing anyone who disagreed with them. The article says that the crowd was too large and too dangerous to break up. Now that's something.

We are told repeatedly that Islam is the religion of peace. We are told repeatedly that the violent ones are the "fanatics". And, we are told repeatedly not to talk about it. "Those fanatic fringes are not the real Islam, so don't talk about it like it is." But I still have to wonder.

I hate to do this, but it's from the subject I know best, so here goes. Consider the Christian parallel. If you examine the largest group that identifies themselves as "Christian", you will find that they are an extremely ambivalent group. They don't hold any beliefs very firmly. They don't claim a Trinitarian doctrine or some Bible infallibility thing or Christian exclusivity. In fact, they largely abhor those things. The largest body of folks who identify themselves as "Christian" jettison many of the beliefs that we Evangelicals claim are fundamental to Christianity. So what do we find? We find that there is a small group in the overarching realm known as "Christianity" that hold to a "pernicious" belief that Christ is the only way to God, that the Bible is the infallible Word of God, and that anyone who dies denying these things is going to Hell. Talk about "fanatics". Now, I hate doing this because the most obvious difference between the fanatic Muslim and the fanatic Christian is that the fanatic Muslim will kill you if he gets the chance, and the fanatic Christian finds that "killing the infidel" is an abhorrent concept. (I know ... there are truly fanatic folks that claim to be Christian who are violent in their views. They blow up abortion clinics or kill prostitutes or urge the murder of homosexuals. I'm not talking about those fanatics. I'm talking about the "fanatic" Christian who simply follows what our source book, the Bible, says is true. The important fact in this parallel is that the particular "fanatic Christian" in view follows the teachings of the book. Those truly fanatic Christians that will kill people over it are not following the Bible by any stretch of the imagination.)

The parallels are there. Those who claim to be Christians, followers of Christ, clinging to the Bible as true, are relatively few in numbers. They are disdained by the larger body of "Christians". (They are likely more disdained by the larger body of Christians than the "fanatic Muslims" are disdained by the larger body of Muslims.) While their views are seen as "extreme", they are supported clearly and fairly by the source book they use. And in both cases the "fanatics" believe that they are the true representatives of the true religion while the rest are not. That is my primary point here. We believe that we are the true Christians and those who don't agree are outside of Christianity. They believe they are the true Muslims and those who disagree are outside of Islam.

Two of the primary differences between the fanatic Muslim and the fanatic Christian I'm pointing to are that the fanatic Muslim will kill you while the fanatic Christian will give you the Gospel, and the fanatic Muslim is marginalized while the fanatic Christian is targeted. You know ... the evil "Religious Right". The Press hates it. The blogosphere hates it. There are entire organizations that have been constructed to fight it, both in the realm of "Christianity" and outside that realm. The fanatic Muslim, on the other hand, only has the police and the military against them. The Muslim world isn't combating them, and the Press is trying to stay quiet about them. "Don't talk bad about 'fanatic Muslims'. Be nice. Remember, they're a fringe. Not all Muslims are like that. Tell you what ... let's not even mention their religion. Those people that are killing innocents day in and day out ... let's not talk about their religion at all. Why should we when we have the Evangelicals to kick around?"

I wonder. In a war against terrorism, is it possible to defeat someone if you don't take into account their core values? Think about it. A criminal typically has some core values that we comprehend. They like their life and freedom. If we threaten their life and freedom, we can often stop their actions. A nation likes their life and freedom. If you threaten their life and freedom, you can often stop their aggression. But when you come across someone who doesn't care about life and freedom -- whose core values are not what you're used to -- defeating them is another matter entirely. Threatening a suicide bomber with death, for instance, simply offers them what they want. If we don't take into account the fact that the core teachings of Islamic theology include the command to kill infidels, can we ever really come to grips with Islamic terrorists? Can we actually find methods to address the problem if we don't ever address the core beliefs? Judging by our success thus far, I'd say not.