artanis_neravar said:
Ghengis John said:
artanis_neravar said:
I'm gonna go with the Bible, hopefully it would help prevent a lot of wars
Won't in the slightest. You're blaming a book for human nature.
The crusades, the holocaust, the Spanish inquisition, the Salem witch trials, and the Muslim terrorists just to name a few
The bible itself does not create war. Human beings create war.
If there were no crusades European lords would have simply kept fighting amongst each other as they did when they were pagan kings and continued to do as "Christians". Furthermore, the real reason for the crusades was economic. The never-ending state of violence in Europe was hurting economic development, and in addition to plunder the war would secure the trade routes of the middle east. To give things a modern context imagine invading a middle eastern country proclaiming to seek WMD's when your real motivation is securing oil.
The holocaust was not prescribed in the bible. It was born of racial hatred, intolerance for the alien other, economic hardship, jingoism and a twisted vision of the science of genetics. It is a prime example of how anything can be bended and distorted to madness. Even science and popular sovereignty.
The spanish inquisition was created to act as secret police for a totalitarian state. It had little to do with religion and everything to do with securing the power of the monarchy.
The salem witch trials were the result of the human need to find scapegoats and human mistrust. The bible specifically condemns bearing false witness against a neighbor and yet whether out of paranoia, to remove a rival or escape a debt that's what people did.
The muslim terrorists do not want to strike america because of religious differences. They want to hurt america because we supplied funds to the muja hadin in the 1980's so that they could fight the soviets in Afghanistan. One of the primary tenants of the muja hadin was that the saudi arabian monarchy was false and had no claim to the throne. Knowing this we gave them the money anyhow and sponsored two decades of terrorism throughout the middle east. While civilians are not the ones who should suffer the consequences the assertion that they despise us for no warranted reason is patently false.
Your understanding of the events in question is quite rudimentary. They were all of them born out of earthly concerns. As long as there are humans there will be conflicts and justifications and prejudices and dehumanization.