Looking *only* at the ideals as presented on the paper, I'd say that Christianity is an idealist world view, while Islam is a pragmatist world view - with all the attendant positive and negative side-effects in either case.
Originally Posted by
BaconWizard
Just out of curiosity, how would you categorize Judaism for comparison?
Obviously pragmatic, especially since the rise of Rabbinical Judaism after the destruction of the Temple.
Which fulfilled many prophecies from both the Hebrew OT and Christian NT.
One would be hard pressed to even believe a temple ever existed in the first century, since the Romans completely leveled/obliterated it.
Luke 19:
41 And as He nears, beholding the City and He laments on Her
42 saying "that if thou-knew, and thou, even indeed in the day, this, the toward Peace of thee, now yet it was hid from Thy eyes.
43 That shall be arriving days upon Thee
and Thy Enemies shall be casting up a siege-work to Thee and shall be encompassing Thee and pressing Thee every which place. [Jeremiah 52:4]
The Destruction of Jerusalem - George Peter Holford, 1805AD
"I consider the Prophecy relative to the destruction of the Jewish nation,
if there were nothing else to support Christianity, as absolutely irresistible."
(Mr. Erskine's Speech, at the Trial of Williams, for publishing Paine's Age of Reason)
The day on which Titus encompassed Jerusalem, was the feast of the Passover ; and it is deserving of the very particular attention of the reader, that this was the anniversary of that memorable period in which the Jews crucified their Messiah! At this season multitudes came up from all the surrounding country, and from distant parts, to keep the festival........
The Temple now presented little more than a heap of ruins ; and the Roman army as in triumph on the event, came and reared their ensigns against a fragment of the eastern gate, and, with sacrifices of thanksgiving, proclaimed the imperial majesty of Titus, with every possible demonstration of joy....................
Concerning the Temple, our LORD had foretold, particularly, that, notwithstanding their wonderful dimensions, there should "not be left one stone upon another that should not be thrown down ;" and, accordingly, it is recorded, in the Talmud, and by Maimonides, that Terentius Rufus, captain of the army of Titus, absolutely
ploughed up the foundations of the Temple with a ploughshare. Now, also, was literally fulfilled that prophecy of Micah- "
Therefore shall Zion, for your sakes (i. e. for your wickedness,) be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the LORD's house as the high places of the forest." (Micah iii. 12)
In executing the command of Titus, relative to the demolition of Jerusalem, the Roman soldiers
not only threw down the buildings, but even dug up their foundations, and so completely levelled the whole circuit of the city, that a stranger would scarcely have known that it had ever been inhabited by human beings.
Thus was this great City, which only five
months before, had been crowded with nearly two
millions of people, who gloried in its impregnable strength, entirely depopulated, and levelled with the ground. And thus, also was our LORD'S prediction, that her enemies should "lay her
even with the ground," and "should not leave in her
one stone upon another, " (Luke xix. 44.) most strikingly and fully accomplished ! --
This fact is confirmed by Eusebius, who asserts that he himself saw the city lying in ruins ; and Josephus introduces Eleazer as exclaiming "Where is our great city, which, it was believed, GOD inhabited ? It is altogether
rooted and torn up from its foundations ; and the only monument of it that remains, is the camp of its destroyers pitched amidst its reliques !"
.
