All Comments (14)

Gustav, you said, "(And, think about it, if humans are made in God's image, as Christians and Jews are taught, then such murder runs perilously close to blasphemy.)"

Gustav, did God order the men into battle? Are you now blaming the actions of men on God? If you are then you're not much of a scholar on things God. Oh wait, I forgot, you're a scholar on religion. I'll let God answer you Himself on your accusation against Him. You will stand before Him one day to be judged. I hope you become Born Again before then.

It's a great achievement for Islamic leaders and scholars as well as Newsweek and the Washington post to present this imperative opportunity for inter cultural and global philosophical dialogue. What's important is that by exchanging our ideas and comments regarding inter religious relations and world events that affect our views of each other as fellow human beings. Since the advent of humanity, We strove to make sense of the world we live in and the lives we've experienced. Worldwide curiosities to learn the true nature of life and our universe is an exceptionally rare virtue upon life on Earth. In other words, we're the only known species on the planet who've pursued to unravel these great mysteries and developed written philosophies based upon our understanding of the world around us.
One such philosophy that lasted throughout the ages of humanity is commonly known as religion and spirituality. Ever since our early belief in the Sky God and the God Mother from ancient Pagan times, we vigorously pursued to unravel the truth about our most profound questions. As any educated person would know that religion and their core beliefs or faith have evolved over time. Paganism, Monotheism and Polytheism have been influenced by humanity as these great philosophies have influenced our perceptions and decisions in life over the ages. Over time humanity has embraced diverse religious faiths and spiritual convictions that continue to influence our behavior in our times and most likely beyond.
What's vital for humanity's progress and even survival is to know the true nature of faith itself. To understand the true origins of faith. But most of all, is to accept the truth for whatever it may be. Each one of us will learn the absolute truth once we die. But until that time comes for anyone of us to depart this world, we really don't know the answer to God's existence nor do we have the absolute truth in regards to the true nature of God. Besides if we did possess the truth, there would've been only one religion on Earth with no diversification of any way, shape of form. There would only be one holy scripture written throughout human history.
Considering one's religious faith to be absolute, while considering others to be false would be ethnocentric at best. While collectively searching to unravel the mysteries on nature, life and the universe through sincere reasoning and serious research would be enlightening at its worst. Most importantly, we must accept the fact is that none of us have conclusive evidence to confirm our core beliefs and there's always an immanent change that our most cherished beliefs could be wrong. Our greatest challenge would be to tolerate the truth no matter what it may ultimately be. With such an open mind, we would be able to overcome any future discovery that would contradict our faith regarding the true nature of life, spirituality and divinity.
Humanity does have the ability to achieve such a social achievement. However, it's solely up to humanity and not any other entity or groups of entities to decide our destinies. Each one of us has a choice to make; either hopelessly engaging into meaningless inter cultural conflicts or combine our scientific and cultural gifts to thrive into an enlightened global civilization that could ultimately expand beyond our solar system. The choice is yours, and the time to make it is now!

Prof Niebuhr,

I'm not religious in any sense, I tend to see these sorts of questions as pointless and non-rational. But I found your comments intelligent and thought provoking. Thanks.

why not include the Japanese-Americans who were so
cruelly herded into concentration camps in WW2, or
the hundreds of thousands killed in Hiroshima, Nagasaki,
Dresden?

Niebuhr wrote: "I could take a piece of paper and write the number 3,454... That would have signified the number of young men and women killed in Iraq to that day" Niebuhr could also have written approx. 650,000 Iraqi children, women, men killed.

"As for Auschwitz... well, only humans attended the Wannsee Conference and humans carried out its orders." Not only were millions of Jews killed or displaced by the Nazis, the Palestinians are still paying the price of the cleansing of their villages to make room for the European Jewish refugees. See Israeli Prof. Ilan Pappe's recent book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine." We need to see the world picture, not just that of the U.S.

Niebuhr wrote: "I could take a piece of paper and write the number 3,454... That would have signified the number of young men and women killed in Iraq to that day" Niebuhr could also have written approx. 650,000 Iraqi children, women, men killed.

"As for Auschwitz... well, only humans attended the Wannsee Conference and humans carried out its orders." Not only were millions of Jews killed or displaced by the Nazis, the Palestinians are still paying the price of the cleansing of their villages to make room for the European Jewish refugees. See Israeli Prof. Ilan Pappe's recent book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine." We need to see the world picture, not just that of the U.S.

That seems like a good way to blame your Devil for other people's actions instead of actually solving problems, Veralynn. Or facing certain realities.

I mean, someone referenced the tsunami; you may call that some kind of evil, or note the people living traditional lives in the area who didn't *build cities on the shore.* And knew when to get out of the way.

Someone said: "Religion does NOT lessen fear of death, religion increases it."

It certainly can.

If you set it up that way.

It can also cause one to *not pay attention* to the world around us.

Don't solve interpersonal and social and international problems... Don't communicate, just blame 'evil.'

Then sooner or later you 'find' it and on and on it goes.

What if God isn't the only powerful spiritual being who intervenes in human affairs? What if there is a major cosmic war being waged, and we are caught in the crossfire? Or, worse than being merely caught in the crossfire, we are in fact the major battlefield?
See "God at War" by Greg Boyd.

BGone

Yes...but remember Muslim extremists are dying to get into paradise,even if Christians aren't.
Those 9/11 fellas bought the whole religious package,hook line and sinker. The virgins were thrown in for added motivation.
I might blow myself up too if I was persuaded that
I would get a heavenly reward of immortality with lots of great sex thrown in.
But never having been indoctrinated its not possible for me to believe such nonsense.

YO-YO:

Religion does NOT lessen fear of death, religion increases it. The fear of death is natural else we would commit suicide to get to heaven. Religion says only the selected few will get to heaven, "many are called while few are chosen" thus adding fear of what happens after death. Religion attacks the psyche at the death protocol.

The best soldiers are the ones that have the least fear of death, only their natural fear and not the additional artificial fear created by the boogie demon lorkinga about in the dark passage from this world to the next. That was more true in ancient times than today when soldiers looked each other in the eye as the killed. Today, stand-off weapons have taken the "personal" touch out of the killing.

Wars are MEGA robberys. Armies are simply gangs robbing other people's banks. The greater the resistance the larger the army required for the successful robbery.

Big surprise, atheists believe in eternal life. Religion is the promotion of eternal death in the form of hell.

Yes it's most disturbing that 3,454 young men and women have been killed in Iraq.
But what about the 600,000 dead Iraqis?
Dont they get even a mention?
Oh..of course...they weren't christian white guys.
Sorry about that. They're going to hell anyway.
And by the way....saying that their are no atheists
in foxholes is another way of saying that fear creates belief in the skygod. If you are scared enough you'll believe in anything.
So thats why people are religious; to cope with their fear of death.
Yeah..I already figured that out years ago.

The essay by Prof. Niebuhr represents one of the best examples of why such academics are correctly viewed as worthless egg heads debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. His essay is pointless and flawed by omissions and bias.

Did Prof. Niebuhr consider putting the number 250,000 on a piece of paper and holding it up in a church service as a way to question the death of the Dec 2004 tsunami that killed a quarter million victims (including many small children)? How about putting the number of children that die each year from birth defects on a piece of paper and asking that question also? etc... Is God the one asserted to be the master of the universe, i.e. omni-present, omni-potent, omni-benevolent? I know of no assertions that man is endowed in his basic nature with such qualities. By the way, if man is created with defects of character built in to his DNA (e.g. sex drive, survival, etc...), who is responsible for these built in design flaws?

Yes man is flawed, but Niebuhr is a professor of religion and this is a forum about faith in God, not faith in man --- this easily answers his rhetorical questions at the start of his essay thus rendering the remainder of his narrative off topic and utterly pointless. I hope his students have an opportunity to have better professors helping them develop critical thinking and analysis skills.

Why do good people do nothing?

Many will mock them or try to stop them if they take action. We are to divided to be right. Whatever good one side does will be negated by the other side. Both sides so sure of being right. But time will tell and we will learn someday. Who will be ready for the truth?

But those who do nothing will find no comfort at all.

Thomas Pain

"THESE are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman."

Prof Niebuhr writes:

"As for Auschwitz... well, only humans attended the Wannsee Conference and humans carried out its orders."

He does well to remind us what happens when good men do nothing.

He then tells us that at last week's Memorial Day Parade:

"It did occur to me...that I could take a piece of paper and write the number 3,454 on it in stark black ink and hold it up as a spectator during our local parade. That would have signified the number of young men and women killed in Iraq to that day--before we lost an additional 10 on the very day itself. But I didn't do that."

...and one wonders why he "didn't do that."