Hi Lam, On Dec 15, 2009, at 12:12 AM, Lam YongXian wrote:
> "Mainstream Islam appears inherently dysfunctional". > > From a spiritual perspective, I think the blame for all the madness is on the > inherent immaturity mind of the people. I believe when Bible talks about sin, > it refers not to events or doings but the source of all evil, the human ego. > The only time when Quran deserves fault is when it fails to spark a light out > of the spiritual darkness. But Quran is just a record of recitation of > Mohammad and why are we pointing finger at non-conscious scriptures when the > real imperfection lies with us? Sorry to not get back to you on this earlier. I won't rehash the entire discussion, but I did want to make one specific point. As Billy said: On Dec 15, 2009, at 11:21 AM, [email protected] wrote: > Anyway, most people of all religions or political systems don't know very much > about the systems they are part of. So it is entirely possible for multitudes > to > go along with almost anything , at least as long as they can more-or-less > flourish > and take good care of their children. The key issue (for me) is realizing that we live inside various *systems*, and all those systems have specific failure modes. If we want to fix, reform, or replace those systems we need to understand the 'causes' of those failure, and design our replacement accordingly. The key failure mode of Islam seems to be dysfunction, an inability to non-violently resolve conflict. Yes, we are all sinful human beings, but sinful human beings still react differently depending on the system in which they are embedded, and some failure modes are less disastrous than others. For fairness, here's an off-the-cuff analysis of other belief systems: * Atheism appears inherently sterile * Judaism appears inherently exclusive * Christianity appears inherently smug * Buddhism appears inherently detached * Confucianism appears inherently authoritarian * Communism appears inherently revolutionary * Democracy appears inherently pandering That is, these gross oversimplifications attempt to capture how these various systems most often fail in restraining human sinfulness. Does that help explain my motivation? -- Ernie P.
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