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« "They hate Americans because Americans resist them." | Main | Ethics Committee To Investigate Cooper » July 18, 2005The Theology of JihadDonald Sensing writes about the theology of suicide bombing, and why it shows Islam is weakening, in his latest-must read essay on the war, The Forever Jihad, Part 3: Are suicide bombers the new High Priests of Islam?. The piece is subtitled "The theology of suicide martyrdom, its theological relationship to Judaism and Christianity and why jihadism is a religion of despair."<. What I basically argue is that Islam’s basic theology of eschatological, salvation by works has been morphed by jihadism into a theology of sacrificial, vicarious salvation in which the suicide bomber gains paradise not only for himself but for any 70 other he wishes. This notion of being saved through through the sacrifice of another is a new thing in Islam and betrays a lack of faith in Islam's historic teachings rather than their affirmation. It shows that jihadists probably believe deep down that salvation is not reliably obtainable through non-martydom works of righteousness, which are Islam's basic commands.Deep down, the soul of man knows that salvation by works doesn't work. Posted in War on Terror
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Interesting post Bill--I went over and read the full thing at Sensing's. I think it is important however to point out how these terrorists have literally hijacked the word "martyr." These terrorists are absolutely not martyrs--for "martyr" by its very definition means that you would suffer or die rather than to renounce your faith. The radical Muslims we speak of are murderers. They do not suffer for their faith, they do not sacrifice for their faith--they kill others "in the name of" faith. So we should start by ceasing to refer to any of them as martyrs. If I see a Christian soldier with a pistol pointed at a radical Muslim's head shouting "renounce Allah or die" and then his head is blown off for not renouncing--then I will grant him the word martyr. Their view of religion is not sacrifice at all, no, it is a militaristic view---war in fact. They randomly choose targets to carry out the "convert or die" mission. Some targets are chosen to serve as examples---or random terror as Stalin so aptly utilized--so that all should live in fear that they might be on the next slaughtering list. In addition, the view that they are sacrificing as Jews and Christians might, I think not. It is not sacrifice to strap bombs to your chest and kill children so that you may attain your bonus prize of 72 virgins. Where is the sacrifice? They're not giving up anything--they're convinced they're going to win the lottery. That in and of itself does not imply sacrifice, it implies reward. This same kind of extremism is seen in the suicide bombers of the Japanese war machine. I don't know enough about the kamikaze pilots of WWII to be able to compare the fundamental traits the radical Muslims share--but it would be interesting to ponder. Posted by: Terry at July 19, 2005 07:30 PMPost a comment
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