Very interesting. I imagine Mohammed viewed the corruption of the emerging post-Roman and decadent-Christian worldview in 600AD as given over to license. Probably an accurate view. Leveraging a waking vision he received from Allah, he decided to enforce a morality on everyone, raised an army, invaded Mecca, and appointed himself as Proph…
Very interesting. I imagine Mohammed viewed the corruption of the emerging post-Roman and decadent-Christian worldview in 600AD as given over to license. Probably an accurate view. Leveraging a waking vision he received from Allah, he decided to enforce a morality on everyone, raised an army, invaded Mecca, and appointed himself as Prophet and his followers as the enforcers of world righteousness. So I guess Islam's question is "How can we end corruption?"
The fallacy (dare I say it) is that the place to start on righteousness is in your own heart, which unfortunately Islam completely neglects.
Instead, the Christian question is "How can I be free from the burden of sin?"
If the question for Islam is, as you suggest, "how can we end corruption?", then it has been an abysmal failure. I am not excusing or suggesting that the West does not suffer from some corruption, but not on the scale seen in most Middle Eastern and other countries. Corruption is precisely one of the mechanisms to obtain and secure power. Hamas, Hezbollah and other radical Islamic groups, are supported by a highly corrupt government, Iran. And, rather than use their funds to better their people, they instead build tunnels, buy munitions, and otherwise engage in jihad. Let me suggest, that just being a nonbeliever does not mean that you are corrupt. Perhaps Islam needs to look in its own mirror and perhaps engage in a reformation before pointing the finger elsewhere.
To a Muslim, anything that leads away from Islam is corruption. It can be people, laws, institutions, art, anything. To them, our Western definition is only a tool to use against infidels and their works.
Then they ought not come here and be tempted. Moreover, they need to answer for why their corrupt leaders do not use the funds provided by others to build schools, hospitals, roads, infrastructure to benefit the people, but instead steal it and use it to build tunnels, buy weapons, and deliberrately install military installations in and under civilian populations making them human fodder - is that not the definition of corruption?
Very interesting. I imagine Mohammed viewed the corruption of the emerging post-Roman and decadent-Christian worldview in 600AD as given over to license. Probably an accurate view. Leveraging a waking vision he received from Allah, he decided to enforce a morality on everyone, raised an army, invaded Mecca, and appointed himself as Prophet and his followers as the enforcers of world righteousness. So I guess Islam's question is "How can we end corruption?"
The fallacy (dare I say it) is that the place to start on righteousness is in your own heart, which unfortunately Islam completely neglects.
Instead, the Christian question is "How can I be free from the burden of sin?"
I don't know. They seem to talk a lot about justice.
If the question for Islam is, as you suggest, "how can we end corruption?", then it has been an abysmal failure. I am not excusing or suggesting that the West does not suffer from some corruption, but not on the scale seen in most Middle Eastern and other countries. Corruption is precisely one of the mechanisms to obtain and secure power. Hamas, Hezbollah and other radical Islamic groups, are supported by a highly corrupt government, Iran. And, rather than use their funds to better their people, they instead build tunnels, buy munitions, and otherwise engage in jihad. Let me suggest, that just being a nonbeliever does not mean that you are corrupt. Perhaps Islam needs to look in its own mirror and perhaps engage in a reformation before pointing the finger elsewhere.
To a Muslim, anything that leads away from Islam is corruption. It can be people, laws, institutions, art, anything. To them, our Western definition is only a tool to use against infidels and their works.
Then they ought not come here and be tempted. Moreover, they need to answer for why their corrupt leaders do not use the funds provided by others to build schools, hospitals, roads, infrastructure to benefit the people, but instead steal it and use it to build tunnels, buy weapons, and deliberrately install military installations in and under civilian populations making them human fodder - is that not the definition of corruption?
... but that would make them Christian ;-)