But that is precisely the period when Christendom was the most violent. In comparison the Islamic world was a model of tolerance.
This is not the way to do comparisons of this type. We don't just look at one religion and say "how were they behaving at that moment vs. how was another religion behaving at that same moment", because the difference in the relative time-depths between the two religions is great enough that any such direct comparison would miss a lot of contextual differences that would make any conclusions highly suspect.
First things first (because I don't want a bunch of irrelevant stuff to be brought up in reply), since we are having this conversation in the context of the wider assertion that "Islam is violent at its root/essentially violent" (which I'm not sure I necessarily agree with; I would rather say it is and has been
contextually violent), what makes the most sense to compare is the earliest time in the spread of both religions, not a snapshot of both in one slice of time where one is already 600+ years old, has spread across the entire known world, and endured several schisms which have destroyed its unity and left it vulnerable to foreign invasions, and the other is just starting out. That is unfair to both.
It is at that level that I believe people are comparing the Islamic conquests with the initial spread of Christianity, as it was not even a hundred years after Muhammad (indeed, within his own lifetime, led by him) that they began and overran so much of the East. This is in sharp contrast with the initial spread of Christianity, which endured several centuries more than the few decades the Muhammad was opposed by the Arab tribes, and yet did not go on significant conquests until after its legalization in 313, and even more after it became the religion of the Empire in 380. By that time, Christianity had already been established for over three centuries in Palestine, Egypt, Syria, India, etc. -- basically all the known Eastern world, and of course plenty of the Western world as well. So that is an essential difference, in that Christianity became much more violent after being tied to empire, whereas in the case of the initial spread of Islam, after escaping their initial persecution (by fleeing to Ethiopia, no less -- the Christian kingdom with a believing king who sheltered the Islamic community and allowed it to survive and grow in his country), a series of conquests were launched that lasted about 130 years (from Muhammad to the Umayyads) and took away by force all of the land in the Near East and North Africa that had been successfully and mostly peacefully converted to Christianity.
Europe was indeed another story, but as we're talking about the initial spread of both religions, and both spread through the East first (since that's where Jesus and the Apostles and Muhammad were all from), Europe can be set aside so as to compare like with like.
The key here is "should be." The fact of the matter is that the average Islamophobic Evangelical doesn't even recognize how Palestinian Christians were effected and how they feel about establishment of the State of Israel. They imagine opposition to Israel is just another sign of Islamic fanaticism.
And that's why the "average Islamophobic Evangelical" can no more stand in for Christianity in general than the "average Christian-and-Shia-and-Yazidi-murdering ISIS recruit" can stand in for Islam in general. After all, such people think that all opposition to Islam is evil and must be crushed, and don't care where it comes from or why. But it's generally best not to take the worst examples from either side and play this stupid game of "no, YOU'RE even worse than me!" if we're talking about how both sides can be and are bad.
If you mean to talk about Evangelical Christian demonization of Islam, say it. Then I'll know not to respond because I'm not one and you're grinding a completely different ax. After all, you and I seem to agree on Palestine.
But that is my point in the first place. These conflicts are not so much about religion as they are about other forces, and that is true in Syria as well.
Then why did you bring it up as an example of why you're not convinced when people say the era of Christian violence is over? Surely you had some kind of point in pointing out that Christians were bad here, there, and everywhere? You don't think it's about religion and yet you say "Christians are the worst". Right. At least attempt to be consistent.
But the fact the Nuris (Kafirs) of Afghanistan survived Islamic rule for 1200 years before this says something as well. After all, they were clearly polytheists. What area of Europe under Christian rule can say the same thing?
Who is talking about Europe but you, though? I am Coptic Orthodox. To me, Europe has been mired in heresy and the worst of Christianity (its contending empires and bloated, stuffy Greco-Roman legalism and repression) since before Islam ever existed. To hell with Europe. Even Europeans hate Europe. I am talking about Christianity in the Middle East and Africa, where it was born, versus Islam in the Middle East and Africa, where it to was born. If you want to get into Islam in Europe, have fun explaining away the devshirme as an engine of economic opportunity for poor Balkan peasant families, how the Muslims were so graciously invited into Iberia (jajajaja...no mames), and all the other things that making this really about Europe would make this be about. Since I don't give a fig about Europe, I won't be having that conversation.
No, I don't. But I do have some idea of the comparative body counts.
Careful not to trip over the mounds of Assyrian/Syriac, Armenian, Pontic Greek, Arab, Mizrahi Jewish, Yazidi, Imazighen, and Alevi corpses piled up all over your argument from numbers when dismounting your "Christianity is the worst" high horse, there.
Where do you think a Jew in the Middle Ages would prefer to live, Christian dome or within the Dar ul-Islam?
I don't know what a Christian dome is, but I think they made their choices or had that choice made for them, so why not either look at what they did or ask some of their descendants what they think, if you think this is such a good question. I don't think it is, because again, I'm not having a discussion about Europe. Europe is not the beginning of Christianity, has nothing of an essentially Christian character (to me; I'm sure plenty of people disagree), and if none of Europe had ever been Christian, my church still would be. Europe is but a blip on the Christian radar, as is America. A point on the map, and nothing more.
Christendom (not Christians)
Now it's "Christendom" as something distinct from Christians? Hmm...convenient.
has historically been the worst largely because the Qur'an contained at least some recognition of revelation outside its own community (there is no people to whom a prophet has not been sent.)
This may fit your own syncretic religion's distinctive approach to other religions, but it's a nonsense statement if I've ever heard one. Where do you think we got the entire Old Testament, the basis of many of our rituals, many of our most beloved figures, and at least some of our outlook from? They didn't materialize out of nothing. Read some history. From at least St. Justin Martyr (100-165 AD) there has been, in writing, a recognition of the essential place of preexisting religions in laying the way for the coming of Christianity, and this is not an anomaly nor anything that has died out in the present day. Christianity essentially began its life as a heretical sect or offshoot of Judaism and remained that way until the expulsion of the Christians from the temple, which essentially forced us to make our own way (first via the Council of Jerusalem in AD 50, then via other local councils until we reached the era of the ecumenical councils in the mid-4th century).
There is also the added element that after the 16th century Christian countries became the most powerful.
I'll be sure to bring this up over the next Agape meal. I'm sure the Egyptians (Sudanese, Syriacs, Armenians...whoever's around) will be super happy that some jerks from Belgium or Portugal or wherever were free to flex their "muscles of Christendom" or whatever all over people who just wanted to be left alone and not murdered by invaders in Subsaharan Africa, the Americas, the Caribbean, etc. Hmmm...just wanting to be left alone and not murdered by invaders...now where have I heard that before...
But I don't think they are necessarily the worst today. On the other hand, I think the tide could easily turn that way and the talk I hear from evangelicals makes me think it wouldn't take much.
Again, by the way you're now bringing this up, I think maybe you're having this conversation with the wrong person. Evangelicals may be fellow Christians in some sense, but I'll be darned if I can figure them out, especially politically.
No, I am responding to those Christians who insist on characterizing Islam as a violent religions. Religions aren't violent, people are.
I see.
I don't think my picture is skewed, but you have to look at my comments in the context in which they are made which is nearly always the context of xenophobic attacks on Muslims and on Islam made by the Christian right.
Your comments, including comments made directly to me even though I'm not a member of the Christian right or an Evangelical, betray a distinctly anti-Christian bias. That's all. You can continue to deny it, but I notice that I am not the only one who has noticed this (and other person who noticed it was also not a far-right Evangelical).
It'd be far easier to talk with you if you'd admit your own biases. I have biases. I don't appreciate the way my people are treated in their own country and how that country's laws explicitly favor others on the basis of religion rather than making everyone truly equal before the law. I don't like Islam as a religion and wish it had stayed in the cave where Muhammad had found it. Now that it's out, though, I refuse to let the fact that some Evangelicals, whose churches didn't even exist 600 or in some cases 60 years ago (let alone 1400, when Islam started), see Muslims as subhuman animals dictate how I choose to voice my grievances or express myself. The problem is not "Muslims are barely people and all up to something nefarious" -- the problem is that there is no true pluralism or respect of the other on the level of recognizing them as a person with inherent dignity regardless of whether or not they belong to your religion or sect. And this is reflected in the law code and the society as a whole in far too many cases and places. I can only repeat what I've already said, which was the rallying cry of the Lebanese at recent marches for a secular and pluralistic Lebanon: Religion is for God, the Homeland is for everyone.
The video I posted in the "How to fix Islam" thread, with Coptic youth standing up for the rights of Bahai and atheists in their country, says much more to me about who is essentially what than the fact that they happen to be Copts and I am also a member of that Church. Until the Muslim majority in every country in which they predominate stands up before their legislators, as these people did, and says "We do not want laws that privilege us as the expense of minorities; we want a truly free and equal society where we are treated equally regardless of confession in every conceivable respect", it is impossible for me to believe that Islam is compatible with the kinds of societies that the majority of humankind, including myself, can live peaceably in. In the Middle East, where Muslims have all the power and Christians and other non-Muslims essentially have nothing that can't be taken away at the whim of the powerful ruling religion, people have been killed for trying to discuss these issues (e.g., Farag Foda in Egypt, Hrant Dink in Turkey, Matoub Lounes in Algeria, etc.), as well as the true history of the Islamic conquests and their impact on the situation of Middle Eastern minorities today that people like you try to brush aside, all the while talking out of the other side of your mouth about how supposedly Christians can't or won't come to terms with their past.
Quite frankly, I've had enough of reading this kind of claptrap for 1400 years. You can keep apologizing for evil all you want, but I'm done with this conversation.
