Uhm, even the headline of that article specifices that it is about common law - and the entire article is about early English law. You are calling me a liar, but you haven't even read and/or understood the headline of the article you are trying to use as a club?

Progress you read the headline. Now try reading the rest of it. I'll help you.


"Islamic law also introduced “two fundamental principles to the West, on which were to later stand the future structure of law: equity and good faith”, which was a precursor to the concept of pacta sunt servanda in CIVIL law and international law. Another influence of Islamic law on the CIVIL law tradition was the presumption of innocence, which was introduced to Europe by Louis IX of France soon after he returned from Palestine during the Crusades. Islamic law was based on the presumption of innocence from its beginning, as declared by the caliph Umar in the 7th century"

I put the quotes in this time to avoid tedious accusations of "plagiarism".

This is (as usual from Original Position) a good post. Acknowledging the existence of bias and questioning one's own position is key to any kind of sound rational inquiry.

I started a thread recently about a project where one can test for "implicit assocations": http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/13...licit-1302617/

It isn't the end of the world, but it is a nice starting to point to make one think about these concepts. Implicit association tests are good because they are very difficult to fake, and they don't get affected by social desirability bias (answers based on the view we think we should have, rather than the view we actually have).

OP and yourself don't seem to understand that no-one knows enough about the history of the world over the millenia to answer such a question sensibly. You can say religion "x" is bad because of "y" or whatever but I don't see the point of that other than having a pop at religious groups you don't like. This sort of question should not be allowed in a religion forum as it is divisive and inflammatory.

On the issue of the (admittedly minor) Westphalia point, recall that you originally said: "...it has been greatly reduced in impact by the peace of Westphalia. All these events lack counterparts in the middle-east...".

I am contending that the dominant impact of Westphalia - the geopolitical organization into nation states - DID have a counterpart in the middle east in that this is their current organization. And yes clearly this is needed as a precursor to both current legal systems, but this is a similarity not a difference. I am not contending that there are not significant differences between the legal systems that comes from many factors, including the ones I cut from your quote. Anyways it doesn't seem like you really disagree with this point.


On the more important point of whether this comparison between legal systems in western countries and muslim majority countries, I strongly disagree that this is a reasonable justification of the statement "Islam is worse than Christianity". I think western legal systems are better than most others around the world, including but not limited to ones in many muslim majority countries. But it seems hopelessly naive to try to shoehorn this as simplying that islam is worse than christianity. For instance, when living in the west, neither christianity or islam has any bearing in the legal system, it is just a non factor for contrasting differences between these two religions as practiced in the west. One goes to entirely secular courts. And of course there are christian countries like uganda that have clear religiously motivated bills for things like killing gays. It is just an entirely unreasonable and cherry picked association to take western legal systems, put that as a point in Christianities favour, and declare it better than islam. I am reminded of all those religious debates where christians look at the horrors in nominally atheist communist regimes and declare christianity superior to atheism.

I am confused why you are ignoring the religious element of the Treaty of Westphalia. Here, from Wiki, are two of the main tenets of the treaty:

(1) All parties would recognize the Peace of Augsburg of 1555, in which each prince would have the right to determine the religion of his own state, the options being Catholicism, Lutheranism, and now Calvinism (the principle of cuius regio, eius religio).[9][10]
(2) Christians living in principalities where their denomination was not the established church were guaranteed the right to practice their faith in public during allotted hours and in private at their will.[9]

Sure, this is the kind of thing I was trying to ask about. You probably missed it since it was the previous page, but when I first asked I was hoping for him to elaborate on why it was relevant because my (openly admitted as very little) understanding was the dominant effect was the establishment of the geopolitical ordering of having sovereign nation states, something shared in muslim majority countries today. In both his subsequent replies tame_deuces agreed with the principle need of having states and didn't mention the kind of religious freedom tenets you expressed here. So it wasn't that I was "ignoring" anything in my general inquiry, in fact an answer along those lines would be quite satisfactory.

Not that any of this justifies the claim that "Islam is worse than Christianity". As in, every muslim I know supports religious freedom. As does every christian. As does every atheist.

Actually no, the Peace of Westphalia has no counterpart in the middle east. I don't think you fully grasp the concept of this peace.

The peace was made because Europe was destroyed. Large mercenary armies with no allegiance was roaming Europe. The large nations had an entire generation that had been brought up in war, the state coffers were bled out, the official armies were in tatters. To call it a treaty is close to a misrepresentation, it was pretty the last hope of survival for the ruling dynasties of Europe. It was this or the death of themselves and their nations. A mere treaty would never have had the lastability of the Peace of Westphalia.. this was a lesson earned as the only alternative to annihilation. Religious strife was a major part of the war it ended, but I don't think the points Original Position mentioned are that important... these were pretty much over and done with half-way through the 30-years war, because their contenders were... well... dead or ruined.

A testament to strength of this is that the treaty has held strong in Europe through some of the biggest wars the world has ever seen.

If you hadn't focused so much on single sentences, you could have been able to see the entire argument. I have never said Muslims are worse than Christians.

I have tried to explain to you, in a fairly detailed and thorough manner my argument as to why I see Islam as worse than Christianity - despite the two religions being almost identical on paper. I have claimed the reason is that Islam has largely developed in countries/regions where it has dictated law, whereas Christianity has developed in countries where it has (for the last three centuries) been dictated by law. In other words, their difference is due to external not internal causes.

But you are - as your last three sentences reveal - to hung up on the idea that I have something against muslims to be able to grasp this. It is, to be honest, fairly tiresome and stupid. Please stop.

The point was the dominant impact of the Westphalia was - and it seems you agree - the geopolitical ordering as sovereign nation states. Yet that is precisely the ordering we see in the Islamic world. As I said earlier, much of this is because of colonial influence on the Muslim world that divided it up into sovereign nation states quite a bit latter than Europe, but today that basic aspect is the same. It is a similarity, not a difference. Note that I am not dismissing other things from your post which ARE differences, like secular vs religious courts and whatever else, I am "focusing" on this one point because it was the one part where the dominant consequence was a similarity not a difference. It isn't wrong to identify the one part in a post you disagree with even if you agree with other parts.

Now I think I have consistently - and accurately - portrayed your charge as "Islam is worse than Christianity" so please don't accuse me of being hung up on something else and in particular I don't think I have accused you of having something against all Muslims or anything of this nature, much less be hung up on it.

That said, I don't think contrasting legal systems in select countries is a reasonable measure of "Islam is worse than Christianity" which is, frankly, a rather pernicious, dangerous and insulting statement to make. As but one example, if we take the practice of Islam in, say, Toronto where I live, the "external forces" of western legal systems and western respect for freedom of religion are in full force.

Heh, the amount of "intellectual wiggling" you would have to muster to claim almost every country in the world with a predominantly muslim population is not a sufficiently representative sample to be able to make claims about Islam and its impact on legal institutions is fairly outstanding.

For that matter, Fiqh legal systems exist in pretty much every country in the world - also the ones where it is not officially sanctioned.

Except I have suggested nothing close to that. If you want to criticize legal systems in many Muslim majority countries then I am right with you. As would my Muslim friends in Toronto. As would many young secularists who bled and died it he Arab Spring. Courts should be secular, religious freedom should be aggressively promoted. But this doesn't make Islam worse than Christianity. These are big multifaceted issues that can be understood in a myriad of ways and the lens of "legal systems in Muslim majority countries compared to Christian majority countries (or worse still western countries if we want to exclude the Ugandas of the world)" is a terribly narrow proxy for this question.

I gave the comparison before, where in religious debates surprisingly often the Christian will suggest that atheism is worse than Christianity because of various atrocities committed under osenstibly atheist communist regimes. The phrase "Christianity is better than atheism" barely makes a shred of sense in the first place but to cherry pick some comparison like this is clearly ludicrous. My recommendation is to stick to criticism of non secular courts. But don't try to shoehorn this into a sweeping, and insulting, generalization of Islam being worse than Christianity.

Terms like "shoehorn", "cherrypicked", "insulting" and other empty accussations about ulterior motive comes of as childish, noisy and horribly boring. I can only assume the issue either makes you angry or you desperately want to start a fight.


Islamic law and Fiqh are parts of Islam. Just like canon law is a part of Christianity (and once was widespread in Europe as official law).

Try responding to this with knowledge, instead of accusation and air. Put something on the table.

Sorry, I will just call it "intellectual wiggling" from now on. Anyways, seems like you have not internalized and certainly not addressed my point so there is little to add...

What is it that you think tame_deuces is comparing when he makes the claim that Islam is worse than Christianity?

That you have muslim friends who are nice? How is that relevant. I shared an apartment with a muslim for 2 years, and she was a very nice person as well. What has this got to do with anything?

Your other point has been addressed to the point repeatedly. At this point failure on your part to realize this must either reside in not reading what I wrote or not knowing what "Islamic law" is. You seem to believe this expression refers to religious laws that by "coincidence" is enforced by some government. This is not the case.

Islamic law is a legal system and tradition, in the same way that civil law or common law are legal traditions. Briefly summarized it is scholarly integration of Sharia law and government law (the amount of sway of either side varies historically). It comes in different forms and shapes, but is definitely a recognized and powerful legal tradition with direct historical and causal ties to Islam. As Cwocwoc (unwittingly) pointed out, it bears some resemblance to common law (aka English law).

More than a "resemblance" and civil law as well as proved to you. You were completely wrong in your assertions and I proved that to you. You called me a liar in your ignorance. Your snide insults are unwelcome.

What you are saying is massively irrelevant to any debate over whether one religion is "worse" than another. Any direct implemetation of "Christian" law or "Jewish" law or "Hindu law" etc etc would attract exactly the same criticisms as you are levelling against Islam. This is not the fault of the religion but rather its interpretation by those implementing it. Regimes like those in Saudi Arabia are regarded as repellent and a subversion of Islam by mainstream Muslims. Why can't you understand this ?

Here is a link for anyone who is actually interested in Islam. It's long but worth watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJ6Zh9jKWKE

I dunno but your comparison with Quakerism was funny. You compared a mass religion consisting of 1.6 billion people with a tiny subset of another religion consisting of 2.5 billion.

No I didn't.

"For instance, I think that the Quaker religion is better than most other versions of Christianity or Islam because it has done more to promote social justice and nonviolence."

I stand corrected you compared a tiny subset of Christianity to 4 billion Muslims and Christians. The assumption is that you are sufficiently knowledgeable about most "versions" (an undefined term) of Christianity and Islam to find them comparatively lacking. I find that funny. That's why this is a divisive and silly topic. No-one is sufficiently knowledgeable to answer the pointless question.

Okay.

I recommend that you watch the clip I posted if you haven't seen it already.

Quite overtly he is comparing western secular legal systems to the legal systems in many muslim majority countries as a proxy for claiming that "islam is worse than christianity". I have no problem comparing these legal systems and finding one worse than the other. However, I think "islam is worse than christianity" is a particularly pernicious and frankly insulting statement which can be - quite rightly - interpreted in a very wide number of ways. So to have it supported by this very narrow claim is unacceptable.

The point is that to these people your way of defending the statement "islam is worse than christianity" just has no bearing on them. They abide by western secular courts and purport to hold western secular values. So while the moniker of being muslims absolutely applies to them - in a couple cases quite piously - this expression of "islam is worse than christianity" absolutely does not in the very narrow proxy you have identified.

Yes I am well aware of this, it doesn't touch my point however.