[Vision2020] Muslim vs. Christian Sectarian Violence

[Nick Gier]

Greetings:

I would like to support Mo Henrickson's claim that many more Christians 
have been killed in sectarian violence that Sunnis and Shias killing one 
another.  Saddam Hussein, hated by Muslim fundamentalists, probably killed 
more Shias than all historical Sunni persecution put together.  Perhaps our 
good friend Ghazi could comment on this.

Prof. Ghazanfar is also the local expert on the contributions of Islamic 
philosophy and science on European culture. (He just published a huge book 
on the subject.) The European Dark Ages came to a close primarily because 
Muslim scholars gave medieval Europe Arabic translations of Greek 
philosophy and science.

Baghdad was the center of the intellectual world for centuries while Europe 
languished in the backwaters of world culture, and Islamic Spain was the 
center of interaction between Muslim, Christian, and Jewish scholars.

The Catholic philosophy/theologian Thomas Aquinas could not have done his 
famous Summa Theologica without Muslim help. Even evangelical Christian 
philosopher believe that this is one of the greatest works on theology ever 
written. Europeans did not get the original Greek texts until Renaissance 
Italians went to Constantinoble and discovered them.

My research has shown that Indian Sunni Muslims were especially hospitable 
to the Shiite minority.  You will recall that my research has also shown 
that Islam spread in India and Indonesia primarily by peaceful Sufi 
missionaries.

I give a lot of credit to Indian Hindus and Buddhists who lived a life of 
religious tolerance and moderation that many Muslims modelled.  Hindu and 
Buddhist fundamentalisms are recent phenomena in which South Asians have 
modelled colonial behavior and attitudes.  For more on this read parts of 
my new book project at www.class.uidaho.edu/ngier/orv.htm.

Let's speak truth, not ignorance about the world's religions.

Nick Gier


"Truth is the summit of being; justice is the application of it to human 
affairs."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Abstract truth has no value unless it incarnates in human beings who 
represent it, by proving their readiness to die for it."
  --Mohandas Gandhi

"Modern physics has taught us that the nature of any system cannot be 
discovered by dividing it into its component parts and studying each part 
by itself. . . .We must keep our attention fixed on the whole and on the 
interconnection between the parts. The same is true of our intellectual 
life. It is impossible to make a clear cut between science, religion, and 
art. The whole is never equal simply to the sum of its various parts." 
--Max Planck

Nicholas F. Gier
Professor Emeritus, Department of Philosophy, University of Idaho
1037 Colt Rd., Moscow, ID 83843
http://users.adelphia.net/~nickgier/home.htm
208-882-9212/FAX 885-8950
President, Idaho Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO
http://users.adelphia.net/~nickgier/ift.htm

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